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ilnlar^ed Worldwide Prohibition Pdition 

For Atlas Legions that Are Uplifting the World 
and Magazine Tables of Reading Booms 


WHY DRY? 

BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION 

Local, State, National and International 

By Rev. WILBUR F. CRAFTS, Ph. D. 



[From British White Ribbon.] 


INTERNATIONAL REFORM BUREAU 

206 Pennaylvanin Avenue a. e.» Waahiniiton, D. C, 


new pages, pp. 129-192, Alphabetical Index, p. 187. 

This Enlarged Edition 50 cents each, S.'IS per lOO, postpaid. 















































REPORT FOR BONE DRY NATIONAL PROHIBITION. 

Presented by Senator Henry W. Blair» Judy 9, 1S88. 



A majority of the committee would 
deem a refusal to submit the proposed 
amendment to the States for considera¬ 
tion analogous to the denial of the right 
of a party to be heard in court upon a 
question of private right. The method 
provided in the Constitution for its own 
peaceful amendment would be destroyed 
by failure to submit the proposition for 
amendment in cases of grave moment in¬ 
volving the approval and prayers of 
multitudes of the people, for where the 
remedy sought is admitted to be with¬ 
out the jurisdiction of the fundamental 
law, the petition is really addressed to 
the only tribunal which can enlarge that 
jurisdiction, that is to say, to the States 
themselves. Should, then, Congress in 
such case refuse to usbmit the proposal 
to the States, such refusal would con¬ 
stitute a substantial denial of the right 
of petition itself. 

The changes in the National Consti¬ 
tution, made indispensable by the de¬ 
velopment of the nation, can only be 
peacefully accomplished by a judicious 
and liberal exercise of the power of 
Congress to propose amendments to the 
States upon the petition of those who 
desire to be heard in the great court of 
the people exercising their sovereignty 
through the States, as In the formation 
of the Constitution. 


It is well known that but for the belief 
in the conventions of the States that the 
opportunity to amend the Constitution 
would be most liberally ^ afforded by 
Congress in accordance with the forms, 
provided in that instrument, the original 1 
ratification never would have been 
obtained. 

While the committee would by no 
means iustify the submission of trifling 
or uncalled-for propositions for the con¬ 
sideration of the States, yet they firmly 
believe that the perpetuity and peace of 
the country under the forms of con¬ 
stitutional government demand that 
there be no captious or arbitrary de* 
nial of the right of petition for the 
amendment of the fundamental ^ law 
through the forms of Congressional j 
submission to the tribunal of the peo¬ 
ple in the States. * ♦ ♦ 

If the proposed amendment should 
be ratified and become a part of the 
national law, the chief curse of the 
world would be summoned to the block 
of national justice, and die by the hand 
of the only power which can wield an 
axe big and sharp enough to cut off its 
hydra head. Then wc should have 
peace. 

But the agitation for the destruction 
of the liquor traffic cannot cease until 
the evils which it inflicts upon mankind 
are removed or the human race is de¬ 
stroyed. It is useless to cry peace, peace, 
when there is no peace. It is time to ^ 
face the subject. ♦ ♦ • 

It is claimed by the advocates of this 
amendment that the liquor traffic is a 
unit of evil which submerges the whole 
nation, and that there can be no com¬ 
plete and certainly no permanent eleva¬ 
tion of any part abeve this "sea of 
trouble" which is not the result of a 
lifting force exerted continuously by the 
nation in its organic capacity every¬ 
where. This evil rant with tiie bloM 
throughout the whole tyttem of na¬ 
tional life, and nothing but national con¬ 
stitutional treatment will cure it 

National constitutional legislation, 
therefore, becomes necessary to preserve 
the police power itself, which under ex¬ 
isting national laws and the relations 
between the States themselves, as well 
as between the General Government and 
the States, is nullified, and the health, 
morals, and good order of society de¬ 
stroyed. 


, of December 27, 18«6, may be found Senator Blair's first amendment pro- 

^bitmp distill^ bquoTs only, and 18 page speech on it. He spoke on it in Senate April 2«, 18M. O* 
Dcrember 12, 18S7, be introduced it in what would now be called the “bone dry" form as follewt: ‘‘Tk* 
manufacture., importation exportation, transportation and sale of all alcoholic beverarea ahall be, as4 fa 
foreTcr prohibited in the United States, and in erery place iubject to their Juristflctlen.'* It VM M 
thii amendment that above favorable report was made. It was defeated March 2, 1889, 88 to 18. 












WHY DRY? 


Briefs for Prohibition 

Local, State, National and International 



By Rev. WILBUR F. GRAFTS, Ph., D. 

II 

Author of “World Book of Temperance”, Intoxicating Drinks and Drugs in All Times and 
Lands”, “Practical Christain Sociology”, “The Sabbath for Man”, Successful Men 
of Today**, Internationalism**, etc. 

WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY JOHN G. WOOLEY. 


HON. CHARLES M. SCHWAB, Director General Government Ship Building: 
Don’t build ships with beer, build them with elbow grease. The nation needs ships to 
win the war; if we’re to win quickly, we must build them quickly. 

HON. A. MITCHELL PALMER, Alien Property Custodian, Sept 17, 1918: 

When this traffic, doomed though it is, undertakes and seeks by secret methods to 
control party nominations, party machinery, whole political parties and thereby control 
the government of state and nation, it is time that the people knew the truth, and it is 
time that we as Americans, * * * stand for the truth, no matter who gets hurt in 
the process. And I say another thing which is appropriate to be said in this great 
hour of the country’s emergency, that the organized liquor traffic of the country is a 
vicious interest because it has been unpatriotic; because it has been pro-German in 
its sympathies and its conduct. You and I know perfectly well that it is around these 
great brewery organizations, owned by rich men, almost all of them of German birth 
and sympathy, at least before we entered the war, that has grown up the societies, all 
the organizations of this country intended to keep young German immigrants from 
becoming real American citizens. It is around the sangerfests and the sangerbunds and 
organizations of that kind, generally financed by the rich brewe**s, that the young 
Germans who come to America are taught to remember first, the fatherland and 
second America. 

H. B. ISHII, Japanese Ambassador to the United States: Alcohol is an ever-present 
menace until it is finally done away with the world over. 


Published by 

The International Reform Bureau 

206 Pennsylvania Ave., s. e., Washington, D. C. 

Price 35 cents each, $20.00 per 100 carriage prepaid. 


Copyright 1918. 




Introduction 



The mind of Wilbur F. Crafts is the nearest thing to omniscience in the 
world movement toward prohibition of the liquor business; 

I write in judgment, not enthusiasm. Through many years he has towered 
like a mountain peak among the more showy thunderheads of prohibition senti¬ 
ment, collecting in a faultless memory all the still, small potentials of the upper 
levels, to deliver them in power on the plain. Some forty volumes represent 
this applied knowledge, every one conceived in scientific method, lit with a hot 
but sane passion of reform to give them vividness with permanence. All of these 
books have gone into repeated editions, and some of them into the fiftieth edition. 

All this time, while his card index and his scrap-books let nothing get away, 
he has fought in the trenches like a common soldier of the line with practical 
assiduity and efficiency surpassed by none and equalled by very few. He has 
completely escaped the too common blemish of scholarship, the preservation of 
useless information and the common fault of agitators—wasted motion beating 
the air. 

And now the breaking up of the long winter of the licensing recusancy has 
released an avalanche of fact, argument and appeal that fills our ordnance depart¬ 
ment inexhaustibly, and buries the army of spirituous dilettanti until the judg¬ 
ment day. 

The value of this latest book is logically as pertinent to all the present 
agitations of social betterment as to the great reform whose progress has in¬ 
spired it. 

It is a handbook of verified knowledge for the leaders and the masses 

IN ENEMY COUNTRY. It IS A WORLD DOCUMENT BY A WORLD AMERICAN, A COSMO- 
POI.ITAN MINISTER OF RELIGION AND A NON-COMMISSIONED MINISTER OF STATE. 

Madison, Wis., Sept 12 , 1918 . John G. Wooley. 


Author 

ifH m 



WHY RATIFY NATIONAL CONSTITUTIONAL PROHIBITION? 


3 


“ After one year from the ratification of this article, the manufacture, sale, or 
transportation of intoxicating liquors within, the importation thereof into, or the 
exportation thereof from the United Sates and all territory subject to the juris¬ 
diction thereof for beverage purposes is hereby prohibited. 

“ Section 2. The Congress and the several States shall have concurrent power 
to enforce this article by appropriate legislation. 

“ Section 3. This article shall be inoperative unless it shall have been ratified 
as an amendment to the Constitution by the legislatures of the several States, as 
provided in the Constitution, within seven years from the date of the submission 
hereof to the State by the Congress.’ 


Why Ratify National Constitutional Prohibition? 

The three most effective pleas for all forms of prohibition are: first, for the 
sake of wife and child; second, for the sake of Capital and Labor; third, for the 
sake of the Nation and the World. And the greatest of these arguments, and 
most entitled to stress when we are discussing national prohibition, whether for 
war time only or forever, is the patriotic argument, which, being interpreted, is: 
We must conserve the forces and resources wasted by drink, including our 
saloon-corrupted democracy, in order to do our part in giving a clean democracy 
to the world. 

There are three distinct stands in this patriotic argument: i. We must save 
for better uses food, fuel, money, transportation, man-power and “ morale ” 
wasted in drink; 2. We must destroy our own secret autocracy, saloon domination 
in politics; 3. We must also destroy our own worst anarchy, liquor lawlessness. 

We have fully discussed that first conservation strand elsewhere (pp. 19-50), 
and shall add but a supplimentary word here, a mere suggestion on “ revenue.” 

When a man, who has signed up for $1,000 in War Stamps, was asked how 
he was going to get the money to pay for them, for it was known that he was 
not well favored with this work’s goods, he answered that he was ‘ going to cut 
out the booze. 

Frank A. Vanderlip, former Comptroller of the Currency, later President of 
the largest bank in America, now serving without pay as Chairman of the War 
Savings Committee of the United States Treasury, recently said: 

“ The plea that Government revenue will be seriously curtailed should not influence 
action, for prohibition will induce a national efficiency which will open new and far 
richer sources of revenue.” 

Following the chronological rather than the logical line, I shall now discuss 
liquor lawlessness, which preceded and led up to saloon domination of politics. 

” Our Friends, the Enemy.” 

Liquor men have done more to bring us to the verge of national constitutional 
prohibition, by their persistent violation of all previous liquor legislation, than 
all the temperance orators with their pathetic pictures of drunkards’ homes and 
their piled-up statistics of the cost and consequences of drink. A majority of the 
voters that carried previous prohibitions have been citizens who were not anti¬ 
alcohol but only anti-saloon. They had no thought of giving up drink alto¬ 
gether 'but they were willing to be at extra trouble to get it, and to drink less 
frequently in order to punish, or perhaps reform, the saloons that were habitually 
violating even the liberal license laws, and forever lording it over more useful 
business and even seeking to dominate politics in their own selfish interest. 




4 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


After Maine had discovered State prohibition, it was seen to be so manifestly 
right and useful that it swept across the land; but while good men were diverted 
to the kindred battle, abolition of slavery, the liquor men were able to dis¬ 
credit State prohibition by persistent violation. The people having a big civil 
war on hand, stretching through the period of reconstruction also, generally 
accepted the theory that lawbreakers could not he brought to order except where 
there was a local majority against them, in which case it was supposed they 
would either voluntarily obey, or be compelled to do so by the preponderance of 
public sentiment. By 1906, there were only three States, Maine, Kansas and 
North Dakota, left under State prohibition, but local prohibition was gaining all 
over the land. The liquor men, however, violated “ home rule'' “ no license ** 
prohibition just as they had violated State prohibition. They bribed and bull¬ 
dozed officials and corrupted elections, often putting in office men who brazenly 
promised to perjure themselves if elected, that is, they promised to “ run the town 
wide open,” which meant they would split the law “ wide open.” 20 of 21 dry 
towns wet mayors. 

This persistent liquor lawlessness proved in the end more a help than a 
hindrance to prohibition. Men who would have been content with local prohi¬ 
bition if they had been allowed to have it in full when they voted it, saw they 
needed not only a larger dry area but stronger enforcement officers than petty 
local officials. And so the people voted in 1907 and after to go back to State 
prohibition. If liquor men would break laws anyway it was better to array 
against them the whole strength of State sovereignty. 

States Rights Invaded by Liquor Forces. 

But, even in the South, with the negro’s perilous susceptibility to drink and 
the cry of "'State rights” to strengthen the State prohibition, it was frequently 
violated—Georgia’s “ State rights,” for example, as expressed in the State law, 
being trampled in the dust, not only by Jacksonville and Chattanooga in adjoining 
states that pretended to be jealous of State rights,” but also by Savannah within 
Georgia’s own boundaries, whose habitual trampling on State law, I told its 
citizens in those nullifying days, should constrain them to forever hold their 
peace on “ State rights.” 

When nullification within dry States was measurably suppressed, wet States, 
in total disregard of “ State rights,” about which some of them shouted academic¬ 
ally, continued to ship liquors into the dry States. State laws framed to prevent 
this invasion were declared by the National Supreme Court to be unconstitutional. 
It took a national twelve years' struggle with the law-defying liquor dealers and 
their political allies, to get Congress to forbid interstate shipments of liquors to 
unlicensed liquor sellers. 

Some.of us urged Congress to dam the liquor traffic at every State line, 
that is, make a complete prohibition of interstate shipments, that every State 
might absolutely control the liquor traffic in its own borders, whether under a 
license law or prohibition law. 

Some reformers would think it unwise to say much about liquor lawlessness, 
lest the impression would be made that if the prohibition law is so much violated 
it is hardly worth having. The lawlessness is emphasized because that is as much 
worse than the liquor as treason is worse than poison. But I will quote two 
demonstrations I made in a prohibition auto tour of Maine in 1911, which were 
based on statements in liquor papers and never challenged by any of the hecklers 
in my audiences nor by the anti-prohibition press. 


WHY RATIFY NATIONAL CONSTITUTIONAL PROHIBITION? 


The Portland Argus on August 5, 1911, said: “ Added to the $100,000 of rum 
sold in the now closed dispensaries, about a million dollars a year goes out of 
Maine for alcoholic beverages.” This estimate was considered as sufficient proof 
that prohibition was a complete failure; but Prof. Emerson, of Lynn, turned this 
roaring gun of our foes into one of the best weapons of the prohibition side, for 
$1,100,000 divided among the 742,341 population of Maine at that time made 
only $1.48 per capita; while the average for the whole population of the nation, 
which was almost half under the “ dry ” policy, was twelve times as much, namely. 
The figure is obtained by dividing $1,598,921,416, the average national 
expenditure for alcoholic beverages for the years 1909-11, according to the 
United States Bureau of Statistics, by the population, 91,972,266. As about 
forty-four millions of these were in 1911 under the “dry” policy, the average 
in “ wet ” territory was probably $25 per capita, or $125 per family in “ wet ” 
territory against $7.40 per family in Maine. “ Money talks,” and in this case 
proclaims that prohibition prohibits. 

“ The Bulletin,” official organ of Maine anti-prohibitionists, furnished an 
equally effective gun with which to convert voters. It paraded the statement 
that twenty million gallons were shipped by mail order houses in 1910 into pro¬ 
hibition States as a conclusive proof that prohibition does not prohibit. But 
divided among the population of the nine States which were that year under pro¬ 
hibition, namely, 15,602,935, this turns out to be only gallon per capita, which 
was only one-eighteenth of the average consumption for the nation, that was 
given as 21.86 gallons by the American Grocer. This average with almost half 
5 ie country “ dry,” meant at least 25 gallons per capita in the “ wet ” territory, 
that is 125 gallons per family against 6^ per family in prohibition States. The 
statement in the Bulletin was that the twenty millions of gallons carried by express 
into prohibition States, which in no case allowed breweries or distilleries inside, 
was “ practically the whole of this traffic.” 

The prohibition of interstate shipments for illegal sale was inevitably violated 
to a considerable degree because interstate shipments “ for personal use ” were 
legal everywhere. The bootlegger must be caught in the act of selling. Liquor 
dealers habitually took advantage of that situation, until the Reid “bone dry” 
amendment made it illegal to import liquors into dry States for any beverage use. 

Liquor men argue. That “ bone dry ” law has put out of commission the 
plea for interstate protection, formerly the strongest argument for national pro¬ 
hibition; but the Reid law came too late to stop the demand for national protec¬ 
tion ; the conviction that the incurably lawless liquor traffic ought to be destroyed 
by the nation because it trampled on State laws had already won to national 
prohibition those who were most jealous of “ States’ rights.” It was felt that so 
long as any State was allowed to harbor the drink, its lawless dealers would 
prey on all dry States, even though the “ bone dry ” law had added a new pro¬ 
hibition for them to break. 

How absurd this cry of “ States rights’’ raised by the liquor dealers against 
national prohibition! What is the “ submission ” of a constitutional amendment 
by Congress but a national submission^' to '‘States rights”! 

When the States formed the national Constitution, they expressly provided 
in behalf of States rights, that change could only be made by Congress sub¬ 
mitting proposed amendments to State legislatures; and they further provided 
that submission should require a vote of two-thirds of the House of Representa¬ 
tives, in which the citizens of the whole nation were represented pro rata, and 


6 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


this action must be ratified by a majority vote of three-fourths of the State legis¬ 
latures. How could “ States rights be more completely protected ? 

From the beginning, the main driving wheel of the prohibition movement 
has been the persistent invasion of States rights by liquor dealers; and, let it be 
remembered, they have broken the mild restrictions of liberal license laws even 
more than prohibition laws. 

Liquor Samples in East St. Louis. 

On July 29, 1918, an investigating committee of the House of Representa¬ 
tives, Hon. Ben Johnson, M. C., Chairman, reported on the race riots in East St. 
Louis, a license city, in July of the previous year, in which 39 negroes and 8 
whites were killed, and 312 buildings and 44 freight cars were burned. At the 
time of the riot, Senator Lawrence Y. Sherman, of Illinois, announced to the 
United States Senate that this lawlessness, which he attributed chiefly to the 
licensed saloons, had converted him to prohibition. He said in a blaze of 
righteous indignation: “ The principal source of the violence, of the fetid, cor¬ 
rosive element that blazed away in disorder and wrote the story across the sky 
over St. Louis, is the infernal, lawless, damnable saloons that have infested the 
town and damned the community for years.” 

The committee report flames with the same burning condemnation, and 
declares that the leaders of both political parties were in the unholy 

LEAGUE OF COMMERCIALIZED VICES AND COMMERCIALIZED POLITICS, wbich haS 

cursed at times nearly all American cities, but is seen in East St. Louis in a 
stronger light than usual on the background of arson and wholesale murder. 
The report says of the carnival of liquor and lust, of which the riot was but the 
natural harvest: “ It was brought about by a combination between the leaders 
of the worst elements of both parties. They pooled issues in the city election 
and declared regular dividends on their investment at the expense of honest 
people.” The report shows that the officials of the city, executive, legislative 
and judicial, were nearly all in league with the liquor and red light gangs, or a 
partner in them. 

The dullest good citizen, indifferent to prohibition lectures and literature, 
gets some anti-saloon sentiment burned into him when he reads in his daily 
paper such a tragedy as that. 

The Committee’s report abounds with the stories of the ruin of young girls, 
far worse than the human sacrifice of savage tribes. In Mexico, for example, 
the traveler is shown the high altar where some beautiful girl, selected for the 
occasion in the old days, was annually sacrificed to the Sun God, her heart cut 
out by the priest and laid, all quivering, on the altar. We do not offer such 
sacrifices as that—not a solitary maiden, but at least a hundred thousand'a year 
we sacrifice to the saloons that damn and dominate the politics of many States. 
All that lawlessness in East St. Louis, not in the riot only but for years previous, 
was a defiant trampling on the State law of Illinois—a liberal license law but 
none the less defied. 

Legislative Bribery Worse Than Riots. 

By so much as treason is worse than murder, because the former affects not 
an individual life only, but the life of the Government, the bribery of officials 

AND CITIZENS BY THE LIQUOR TRAFFIC IS WORSE THAN ANY DISORDERS IT MAY 
PROMOTE, and when such an effort is made by a national organization it assumes 
the nature of an organized invasion, with money for ammunition, and the defeat 
of majority rule as its treasonable objective. 


WHY RATIFY NATIONAL CONSTITUTIONAL PROHIBITION? 


7 


When the National Liquor Dealers' Association, in 1903, appealed to all 
liquor dealers of the nation to contribute five millions of dollars to defeat pro¬ 
hibition legislation in State legislatures and in Congress, the following state- 
m^ts were made: 

" Our State associations are charged with looking after legislative proceed¬ 
ings; ” *‘this national organization was formed to attend to Congressional af¬ 
fairs;” “to defeat all such {temperance) measures, if possible, is a part of the 
onerous work” 

The following quotations from an editorial in the December 20, 1903, issue 
of Truth, the liquor organ of Michigan, then wet, shows just what the liquor 
people understood as to the use of the great fund: 

“ The experience of the liquor trade of Michigan in the past has taught them that 
the raising of money in large or small quantities for use in the legislature has always 
resulted disastrously for the trade.” 

“ It is true that years ago the liquor trade of Michigan raised large sums for 
legislative work and the old timers in the trade have not forgotten that the legislatures 
of those days took their money and passed the bills against them every time.” 

^That is to say, the plan of bribery did not succeed. So the virtuous liquor trade 
of Michigan quit it. Truth continues:) 

“ Grafters in the legislature, and all legislatures have them, no longer introduce 
bills against the liquor trade in this State as they have been taught there is nothing 
in it for them but a stiff fight in their district next time.” 

^ “ The raising of money by the liquor trade to further its interests in legislative 
bodies meets with almost universal disapprobation. Men who are known as drinking 
men and who have no fault to find with the saloon denounce such methods. The liquor 
trade exists through public approval. Just as soon as the trade loses this approval 
it will cease to exist. Raising of funds to corrupt the machinery of the government 
and pubilcly announcing its intent to do so will not aid the trade in holding public 
confidence.* 

Talk about invading States rights! Both State and national rights have 
been invaded by such organized efforts of liquor dealers to decide governmental 
action by secret use of money, rather than the open casting and counting of ballots. 

There are two or three twists of the “ States rights " objection that need 
a few additional words of reply. 

That a majority of the population might he in thirteen big wet States is a 
purely academic objection. The early ratifications, including Massachusetts, 
make it wholly improbable that such will be the case. It would in any case be 
in accordance with the Constitution, just as a President may be elected through 
the Electoral College by a minority vote of the American people. 

The decisive fact in this matter is that the prohibition amendment was sub¬ 
mitted by a vote of eight more than two-thirds in the House of Representatives, 
which represents, pro rata, the whole population of the nation. About three- 
fourths of the population live in dry territory, made so by their own votes. 

It is also pertinent to note that in the first fourteen States that ratified, in¬ 
cluding six States then wet, Kentucky, Maryland, Massachusetts, Delaware, 
Louisiana, and Texas, the vote was four-fifths for ratification. 

Concurrent Jurisdiction. 

Liquor men are trying to capture some Southern States by the “ carpet 
bagger " bogie, crying that the National Government may send federal officers 
to enforce national prohibition, even though the State has concurrent power in 
enforcement. In such cases the federal power, except as internal revenue is 

♦The whole story is given in full, with the letter, in The American Issue of Jan. 22, 1904. When 

this letter got unexpected publicity and much condemnation, the President of the National Liquor 
Dealers’ Association added a belated postscript that “it was intended to raise money for legitimate 
purposes.” 



8 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


concerned, leaves the enforcement to the State, and only interposes when the 
State notoriously neglects to do its duty, which is not likely to be the case in 
any dry State. 

The New York City Bar Association, whose members we can but feel are 
prejudiced by a big practice among those in the liquor business and closely related 
banks and industries, declared against the ratification of the National Prohibi¬ 
tion Amendment by the State Legislature because of alleged difficulties in the 
provision for concurrent jurisdiction. In reply, the New York State Anti- 
Saloon League has cited several decisions which show there is nothing new nor 
strange in such concurrent jurisdiction. The fact that it has not been specific¬ 
ally stated in other national Constitutional amendments is not important. It was 
probably not essential to say it is in this case. It was put into the law chiefly 
for the information of those who might not have understood that such con¬ 
current jurisdiction is assumed as a matter of course in a case where the same 
thing is forbidden by both State and national law. We quote one Supreme 
Court decision, which seems to us conclusive and sufficient. There are several 
more of the same tenor. 

In the case of Houston vs. Moore, Justice Johnson rendered the following 
opinion: 

The Constitution containing a grant of powers, in many instances similar 
to those already existing in the State governments, and some of those being of 
vital importance, also, to State authority and State legislation, it is not to be 
admitted that the mere grant of such power in affirmative terms to Congress, 
does, per se, transfer exclusive sovereignty on such subjects to the latter. On 
the contrary, a. reasonable interpretation of that instrument leads to the conclu¬ 
sion that the powers so granted are never exclusive of similar powers existing in 
the States unless where the constitution has expressly, in terms, given an exclusive 
power to Congress or the exercise of a like power is prohibited to the States, 
or there is a direct repugnance or incompatibility in the exercise of it by the 
States. The example of the first class is to be found in the exclusive legislation 
delegated to Congress for places purchased ^ ^ * for forts, arsenals, dock¬ 

yards, etc.; of the second class, the prohibition of a State to coin money or emit 
bills of credit; of the third class, as this court has already held, the power to 
establish a uniform rule of naturalization and the declaration of admiralty and 
maritime jurisdiction. IN ALL OTHER CLASSES ALREADY MEN¬ 
TIONED IT SEEMS UNQUESTIONABLE THAT THE STATES RETAIN 
CONCURRENT AUTHORITY WITH CONGRESS. 


Liquor Lawlessness Before and in This World War. 

Before the world war, the cumulative effect of almost three-score years and 
ten of persistent lawbreaking by liquor dealers, accompanied by their corrup¬ 
tion of politics, had so re-enforced the familiar standard arguments of prohibi¬ 
tion, that on December 22, 1914, the U. S. House of Representatives gave a 
majority vote for the Hobson-Sheppard national prohibition amendment—197 
to 189, not two-thirds but eight majority. This sufficiently indicates that the 
nation was ready for national prohibition. Dry States were added every year, 
giving to the people of each State vivid first-hand proof of the need of national 
prohibition in the continued efforts of liquor dealers to override these new 
verdicts of the people. Prohibition helped greatly everywhere, but the full 
fruition of its benefits was abridged by liquor lawlessness. 


WHY RATIFY NATIONAL CONSTITUTIONAL PROHIBITION? 


9 


The world war, even before we entered it, brought powerful re-enforce¬ 
ment to the argument for national prohibition, for every belligerent nation, by 
some restrictive or prohibitory legislation branded Drink as a foe in the rear 
that must be curtailed or interned. (See pp. 19-50). 

In the United States during our first year of war, though unprecedented 
appeals were made by the men and women of li^ht and leading to the President 
and Congress to conserve food and fuel and money and transportation and man 
power and “ morale ” by immediate and complete prohibition, we made even less 
restriction than Great Britain or France—no restriction at all except such as 
came from a very inadequate enforcement of a prohibition of liquor selling to 
soldiers, modified in France by permission to American soldiers to “ buy or 
receive as a gift wine and beer,'’ and by permission to soldiers in the United 
States to drink without limit when at home on leave or when a bona fide 
guest ” anywhere—an order that opened the way to much drinking, and led—as 
it should have been seen that it would—to such results that it was repealed after 
doing its evil work for half a year. 

The Senate voted to prohibit the use of grain to manufacture liquors, to 
which distillers made no objection as they had more than two years’ supply on 
hand, the price of which would rise if distilling was stopped; and besides they 
had work enough ahead in making munition alcohol. But the brewer, whose 
product is kept only a few months, came in on the Senators like a flood, and 
brought such influence to bear that the vote was immediately reversed. Soon 
after, the Senate voted the distillers should not take out whiskey during the 
war for beverage purposes, and this time the distillers made a drive on the 
Senate, and again this highest legislative body of the nation turned a quick 
summersault. These and other similar facts are added links in the argument for 
national prohibition because of the saloon’s domination of politics. 

When we are fighting to make the world safe for democracy we can not 
afford to have British and American and French democracies—the best in the 
world—thus autocratically controlled by the worst of trades. 

Wide Significance of German-American Alliance Suppression. 

On July 31, 1918, the President signed the death warrant of the German- 
American Alliance—the annulling of its charter by Congress. What had it 
done? The investigation by a Senate Committee showed that it was one of 
half a dozen agencies of the United States Brewers’ Association, the chief mission 
of all of which was to influence secretly both citizens and officials in their civil 
acts with reference to the liquor issue. Because the German-American Alliance 
was also shown to be pro-German it was suppressed, but no action was taken 
against the Association “ higher up ” for its secret work in politics in restraint 
of the civil rights of officials and citizens, nor even for its financing of the pro- 
German propaganda. This sparing of the brewers, the chief offenders, shows 
that “ King Alcohol ” is still a mighty force in American politics—even in 
national politics. 

The United States Government has had in hand since 1914 a carload of 
evidence of the brewers’ political activities which it seems very reluctant to use. 
It consists largely of brewers’ books seized when Pennsylvania brewers were 
charged with corrupting the November election of 1914 in that State. It was 
shown they had put a million dollars into that election. The brewers plead 
Nolle contendere and accepted a fine of $70,^0—a small seven per cent, tax 
on their investment—rather than allow the seized testimony to be produced in 


10 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


court, but through the Senate investigation of the German-American Alliance 
and otherwise many of the facts in the case have come to light. 

It is fully shown that the German-American Alliance, which is de-chartered 
but not destroyed, was but one of half a dozen tenticles of the brewers’ political 
octopus. The others remain intact to continue the effort to manipulate politics 
secretly in the interest of one trade, and that the worst of all, one by boycotting 
business men; another by defeating dry candidates; others by manipulating the 
negro and labor votes. 

One of the brewers’ political agencies is called the National Association of 
Commerce and Labor, a name admitted to have been chosen because of its 
resemblance to a government bureau. No doubt many an ignorant or careless 
person has been unduly influenced by its threats and proposals because he sup¬ 
posed them to be official. 

Mr. Percy Andreae, who superintends the political activities of the United 
States Brewers’ Association and who effected the “ Organization Bureau ” of 
the German-American Alliance, is the president of this National Association of 
Commerce and Labor at a salary of $50,000. 

In a speech made at the time of the organization of this association Mr. 
Andreae thus describes the careful political surveys made in the Congressional 
districts: 

“ The value of this work to the [brewing] industry in each State wherein it is 
accomplished will be very appreciable, for it is impossible to obtain and use as I have 
described the political knowledge concerning Congressional districts in any State 
without at the same time acquiring the same data concerning the counties and sena¬ 
torial districts of that State.” 

Vast Sums for Politics. 

Mr. E. L. Humes, U. S. Attorney at Pittsburgh, who conducted the prosecu¬ 
tion of the brewers of that State, on charge of corrupting the elections of igi 4 > 
to an affirmative issue, says: 

“The financial activities of the National Association of Commerce and Labor in 
carrying out this comprehensive plan of Mr. Andreae are most interesting. During 
the year 1914 the United States Brewers’ Association turned over to Mr. Andreae the 
sum of $ 330 , 138 . The Wholesale Liquor Dealers’ Association paid him $ 90 , 000 . These 
items and miscellaneous contributions which he received aggregated in that year 
$ 525 , 116 . 28 . The only activities of Mr. Andreae and his associates were politick in 
nature. They participated extensively in numerous State campaigns, using their funds 
to influence the election of governors, lieutenant-governors. United States Senators, 
members of Congress, and members of State legislative bodies. 

“ The extent of the operations of the United States Brewers’ Association in 1914 
reached startling proportions. ... In 1914 we have an absolute record of col¬ 
lections aggregating at least $ 999 , 300 . 88 . How much more was collected during that 
year, of wffich we have no knowledge because of the destruction of the association 
records, we can make no estimate. We do know, however, that the bank accounts 
which we have thus far succeeded in discovering show an aggregate in the neighbor¬ 
hood of a million and a half dollars.” 

Wholesale “ Fraud in Texas.” 

In their political activities the brewers have attempted to control large 
sections of the population voting in federal elections. The evidence of the Texas 
trials concerning the manipulation of the negro vote is abundant. An agent of 
the brewers writes (p. 263 of official record of evidence) : 

“ I have four thousand cards like the inclosed and I will place one prominently 
in every negro barber shop, eating house, saloon, and every other negro business in 
Texas and will supplement this advertisement with the help of every negro official 
in secret lodges, every negro preacher, and the negro newspapers in Texas. I am 
satisfied I will induce at least 50,000 negroes in Texas to pay their poll taxes in time.” 
The extent to which these operations have gone on comes out on p. 287 . Paget, a 


f 


WHY RATIFY NATIONAL CONSTITUTIONAL PROHIBITION? 11 

political agent of the brewers, boasts; “If I had ten days more, there would have 
been 70,000 poll taxes paid.” How the political work among negroes is masked can 
be illustrated by one instance (p. 78 ): “ Prior to 1910 , one J. D. Griffin, a negro 

preacher, known as Sinkiller Griffin, and other negroes formed an organization under 
the name of the Rescue Association of the United States of America and Africa, and 
incorporated the same under the laws of the State, the charter granted authorizing it 
to engage in the work of rescuing fallen women. Such charter was secured in fraud 
upon the State and the public; and the purpose of such organization has never been 
such as named, but to do political work principally among negroes for the Texas 
Brewers’ Association.” 

Widespread and successful attempts to control the labor vote are indicated 
in E. Lowry Humes’ Memorandum to the Federal Court at Pittsburgh: 

“ An official of the brewers’ political organization in his report concerning a 
particular State remarked: ‘I went over the State with a view of meeting with the 
most influential labor men and in securing their support now and in the fight that 
may come; and I am sure if it is necessary we can muster to our support all the labor 
men in the State with one or two exceptions, and they believe they can deliver the 
union-labor vote.” 

The name of Mr. Samuel Gompers, President of the American Federation 
of Labor, appears in the evidence that the Federal Government is for some 
reason holding back, neither using for prosecution, nor allowing for publicity. 
The evidence does not show any cash reward given Mr. Gompers for his 
frequent defenses of beer, but he is spoken of, as Dr. Clarence True Wilson 
puts it, as if he were “ a regular of the U. S. Brewers’ Association.” 

Mr. Hexamer, head of the German-American Alliance, was on the executive 
committee of the brewers’ so-called National Association of Commerce and 
Labor. Under his direction was carried on not only most of the pro-German 
propaganda but a large part of the beer propaganda as well. Joseph Keller, 
the president of the School Board of Indianapolis, was the secretary of the 
National German-American Alliance. An article in the Indianapolis News of 
May 24, 1917, exposing his operations, says: '‘Keller, according to the facts 
gathered by the government, was using the organisation bureau of the German- 
American Alliance to elect State officers. United States Senators, Congressmen, 
and members of the legislatures in States where an effort was made to pass 
laws regidating the liquor traffic. In 1914 he spent about $38,888 in his propa¬ 
ganda in favor of the liquor interests; and his work was not only in Indiana but 
extended to Ohio, Illinois and Texas. The $38,888 that Keller spent for the 
liquor interests came, the investigation by the government shows, from the 
United States Brewing Association and was paid by members of that association 
in a roundabout way so that the public would not detect it. 

Mr. Humes says: 

“ The government is not in a position because of destruction of records to estab¬ 
lish definitely the total amount of money that was raised and expended by the Penn¬ 
sylvania State Brewers’ Association for its political purposes in 1914 ; but the records 
of one bank esablish that there was paid into the treasury of the Pennsylvania State 
Brewers’ Association for its political purposes in 1914 the sum of 349 , 892 . 11 , and that 
during that same year in its efforts to elect the slate which it had selected there was 
expended from this one bank account alone the sum of $ 348 , 696 . 91 . There may be 
other bank accounts which the government has not been fortunate enough to discover.” 

“ The defendant companies through this association undertook to control the 
nomination and election of practically every public officer elected within our Com¬ 
monwealth of Pennsylvania from governor down, including members of Congress 
and United States senators. At a conference called by its representatives in 1914 , 
candidates for legislature and state senate, for members of Congress, for United 
States senators, and for governor v/ere selected and not only the individual effort 
but the moneys contributed to this association by the brewing companies who have 
entered pleas in this case were used to put through the slate thus selected.” 


13 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


Brewers Organized Boycotting of Dry Business Men. 

The very heart of democracy is stabbed by another branch of the brewers’ 
political activity, whose bribery takes the form of boycott, a form of German 
“ frightfulness.” A large group of Chicago business men appealed to Congress to 
pass the Barkley-Webb amendments to the Lever bill. Each of these men re¬ 
ceived immediately a bullying letter from A. P. Daniels, the manager of the 
Chicago Manufacturers and Dealers’ Association—an attack on the citizen’s 
sacred right of petition. 

Let me add from the withheld evidence some samples of the brewers’ boy¬ 
cotting. An eminent manufacturer, who had considerable brewery patronage 
for a general article of merchandise, took an active part in closing by law 
enforcement a saloon opposite his own factory, which was manufacturing in¬ 
efficiency among his workmen, as well as breaking the laws of the State. The 
brewers’ boycot agency called him to account, and threatened to cut off all 
patronage from brewers if he did not sign away his liberty as a citizen by promis¬ 
ing to let the saloons alone, however harmful and lawless. The boycot, he 
feared, would bring bankruptcy to his business, and so he went bankrupt in 
character by signing the abject promise. He should have fought as bravely 
against such an assault on democracy as if the attack had been by Hun soldiers 
in the open instead of cowards in the dark. 

Another case of the brewers’ boycot was that of an esteemed automobile 
manufacturer, who was linked up in business with a whole group of firms in 
the same business for economies in trade. He made a generous contribution 
to the prohibition campaign, and because of that exercise of his rights as a 
citizen, the whole association was threatened with a nation-wide boycot by 
brewers and whoever else they could mobilize for the attack unless he should 
withdraw. Soon after, the prohibitionist withdrew from the association, prob¬ 
ably out of consideration for his associates. In yet another case, the only 
offense was that a business man was overheard on a train condemning the saloon. 
He was offered his choice to sacrifice free speech or be crushed by a boycot. I 
do not know what choice he made. 

What Men May and May Not Do in Political Defense of the Trade. 

Of course every man has a right to transfer his individual patronage or his 
work, and he has a right to form an association to promote or defend any 
legalized trade by all the legitimate methods of democracy—by lectures, literature 
and lobbying. It is an ignorant notion that citizens may and should be forbidden 
to talk to legislators about pending bills. As well say a king may not speak to 
his cabinet ministers. Legislators are the representatives of the Sovereign 
People,” and it is not only their right but their duty to confer, even better to do 
it openly than by letter or telegram. It is not the open interviews in a legis¬ 
lative lobby that are likely to be corrupting, but more secret interviews else¬ 
where. The primary and the lobby are the handles of politics, both left too 
much in the hands of bad citizens, who pull down—good citizens must lay hold 
of them and lift up. 

What is it that associations may not properly do in politics ? The 
Washington Post of September 2, 1918, quoted a decision of Lord Moulton, 
of the British Privy Council, that any promise that a legislator will act as 
desired by any person or group or in their separate interest has in it the taint of 
bribery and is a violation of the trust that inheres in public office. Lord Moulton 


WHY RATIFY NATIONAL CONSTITUTIONAL PROHIBITION? 


13 


said in part: “The position of a legislative representative is that of a 

MAN WHO HAS ACCEPTED A TRUST TOWARD THE PUBLIC, AND ANY CONTRACT, 
WHETHER FOR VALUABLE CONSIDERATION OR OTHERWISE, WHICH BINDS HIM TO 
EXERCISE THAT TRUST IN ANY OTHER WAY THAN HE CONSCIENTIOUSLY FEELS TO 
BE BEST IN THE PUBLIC INTEREST IS ILLEGAL AND VOID.” 

The bo^xot, like lynching and riots, belongs to the guerilla period of savagery, 
and has no place in an age of orderly justice when no man can legally be de¬ 
prived of life, liberty and property until he has had a chance to state his case in 
court. Right now, while the world sees and feels the far-reaching results of the 
uncharted rule of brute force, we should banish every lesser manifestation of 
the same crude barbarism from our own land. Neither Kaiser nor brewer 
should be allowed to substitute terror for law. 

Let no one suppose the brewers^ terrorism has ceased. In the spring of 
1918, at the very time of the investigation of the brewers' anti-American and 
anti-prohibition activities and within two hours' ride of the brewers’ national 
headquarters, a lumber company, whose president is a strong prohibitionist, 
asked to be excused from loaning one of their auto trucks for a prohibition street 
meeting because such an act would bring a boycot on the company from all 
their local brewery patrons at least. 

The representative acts of the liquor dealers that I have cited, which are 
in restraint of the civil rights of private citizens and public officials, should be 
of great service in marshalling against the liquor traffic every man who believes 
in law and order, in liberty and justice, in democracy and civilization. Mr. 
Humes, in concluding his testimony on the German-American Alliance, referred 
to the inadequacy of our corrupt practices acts, that require political candidates 
and party committees to report all their expenditures in political campaigns but 
make no such requirement of other organizations active in politics, good and 
bad. Every State legislature should take serious note of his suggestion that 
there should be “ some kind of a corrupt practices act that will prohibit organiza¬ 
tions of this kind from participating in politics except under legal supervision, 
with control of their expenditures.'* 

“ Inciting to Rebellion.” 

Under the caption, “ Inciting to Rebellion,” the Brewers’ Journal of August, 
1918, reached a climax in the saloon’s defiance of law which should hasten its 
end. Aroused to frenzy by the fact that the U. S. Senate, in July, 1918, voted to 
take up war prohibition on August 26, with the probability that the manufacture, 
transportation and sale of intoxicating liquors would be prohibited after that year 
during the war and demobilization everywhere under our flag, this official 
ORGAN OF THE BREWERS ARGUES FROM THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE THE 
RIGHT AND DUTY OF BEER DRINKERS TO MAKE AN “ ORGANIZED ” REVOLT IF CON¬ 
GRESS PASSES THE PENDING BILL. We had a “ whiskey rebellion ” long ago, and 
made short work of it. We have more soldiers handy now, and a threatened 
beer rebellion brings no terrors; but this anarchistic editorial is so complete a 
display of the selfish lawlessness of the liquor trade that I quote it^ entire, be¬ 
lieving that to red-blooded Americans, who have given service to win the war, 
this call to a beer rebellion will prove the most conclusive argument we have 
had for war prohibition to meet the present emergency, and for Constitutional 
prohibition to make permanent the overthrow of this autocratic and anarchistic 
trade. 


14 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


Inciting to Rebellion. 

[Editorial, Brewers’ Journal, August, 1918 .] 

Intolerable conditions have always actuated human beings to resistance. All 
revolutions have been caused by oppression, arbitrary acts of rulers and governments, 
and by deprivation and misery thus produced. 

What else can a thinking being do but resort to action which will remove the 
causes that make him or her miserable, but make common cause with fellow sufferers 
to end the misery afflicting them? 

The Declaration of Independence says: “Prudence will dictate, that governrnents 
long established, should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly 
all experience has shown, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are 
sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing forms to which they are accustomed. 
But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object, 
evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their 
duty, to throw off such government, and to produce new guards for their future 
security.” 

The right thus affirmed by the fathers of this country, upon whose call the Amer¬ 
icans in 1776 threw off the yoke then oppressing them, is still inherent in our present 
generation and those who are now to be oppressed and to be deprived of the liberty 
to choose their own way toward the pursuit of their happiness WIEE CERTAINEY 
NOT SUFFER DUMBEY AND WITHOUT AN ORGANIZED ATTEMPT TO 
WREST THE POWER OF OPPRESSION FROM THE HANDS OF THEIR 
WOUED-BE OPPRESSORS. (Capitals ours.—Ed.) 

Here we are: Over one hundred millions of Americans, of whom an overwhelm¬ 
ing majority of all adults have been accustomed to consume certain beverages which 
bring them refreshment and relief from the drudgery and sorrows of labor and its 
sequence of physical and mental exhaustion. They are to be suddenly deprived of 
these beverages. The British King, against whose oppressions our forefathers rebelled, 
would never have thought of an outrage like that. He knew that the American 
colonists might be taxed without their consent, bulldozed by his hired soldiers and 
all the rest of his monarchical machinery, for some time. But he also knew that to 
take away from them their beer, wine and spirits, would bring about the revolution at 
once. This the present rulers in Europe know also. They would not dare to suddenly 
introduce prohibition. They have seen what happened in Russia. And they, there¬ 
fore, shrink from following the ex-Czar’s foolish example. IT IS BUT NATURAE 
THAT ANY PEOPEE WHO ARE COMPEEEED TO SUDDENEY CHANGE 
THEIR CUSTOMARY METHODS OF EIVING WIEE BECOME REBEEEIOUS 
AND TRY TO THROW OFF THE OBNOXIOUS YOKE THUS THRUST UPON 
THEM. 

But this is not all: What is a man, or a woman, to do whose property is to be 
suddenly taken away? There are several million Americans whose property, amount¬ 
ing to over two billion dollars and invested in the beverage-producing industries, is 
to be wiped out forever. Are these Americans to tamely submit to that outrage? OR 
ARE THEY TO BECOME REBEES? The British King would have shrunk from 
the idea of brutally reducing an entire class of his American subjects to beggary. He 
knew that thereby he would precipitate a revolution. He might tax the colonists 
without permitting them to be represented in the tax-making governmental machine. 
But he would never have thought of closing their shops and factories and taking from 
them their raw material, tools and finished products. 

Nor would the British King ever have thought of depriving a large'part of the 
population of his colonies of the possibility of making a living by their daily labor. 
He knew that such action would result in adding that part of the population to the 
number of those academically propagating the idea of an ORGANIZED REVOET. 
What is any one to do who no longer can make a living at the trade to which he, or 
she, has been apprenticed? The masses of working people who are to be suddenly 
thrown out of employment will naturally become revolutionists. There is nothing 
else left for them to do. Are they to tamely submit to seeing their wives and children 
starve to death? They will not! THEY WIEE JOIN THE RANKS OF THE 
REBEES WHO ARE INCREASING AT A TREMENDOUSEY RAPID RATE 
IN AEE PARTS OF THE CIVIEIZED WORED. 

PROHIBITION IN AMERICA MEANS ACCEEERATING THE SOCIAL 
REVOLUTION, which is to forever bury out of sight the parsons and politicians who 
are too stupid to know what they are doing. 

Above incitement to a rebellion has been brought to attention of Attorney General. 


WHY RATIFY NATIONAL CONSTITUTIONAL PROHIBITION? 


15 


Other arguments for prohibition from its hygienic and economic benefits 
to the individual in his home and business are convincing, but the argument for 
prohibition from the lawlessness of liquor dealers and their attempts to dominate 
politics and terrorize offcials and citizens should be more than convincing—it 
should he AROUSING. 

We have noted numerous saloon confessions of local lawlessness in the dis¬ 
cussion of “ No license,” but in this discussion of National Prohibition we find 
our chief argument in the organized, nation-wide lawlessness of the liquor traffic. 

In place of what our subservient government has allowed distillers to blow 
into the bottles they fill in bonded warehouses, where the Government stands 
senior partner, with much the larger profit, “ Bottled by the United States Gov¬ 
ernment,” we now have the opportunity to write by national constitutional pro¬ 
hibition, " Throttled by the United States Government.” 

“ Personal Liberty ” Versus Public Welfare. 

This war time, when Liberty has a noble world-wide significance, is a good 
time to riddle the “personal liberty” objection to prohibition, and set over 
against liquor lawlessness, liberty under law, for which we fight. 

Four centuries ago, like the flash of northern lights around the upper sl^, 
all Europe was electrified with the cry, “ Religious liberty.” There was nothing 
selfish in the cry. It meant, to the men who uttered it, liberty to die that their 
children might have liberty to pray. In the next two centuries that light worked 
down into the lower sky, and Europe rang with the cry, “ Civil liberty.” There 
was nothing selfish in that cry. To the men who uttered it, it meant liberty to 
die that their sons might have liberty to govern themselves. 

Alas that this word of heavenly glory should now be oftenest heard in that 
synonym of personal deviltry and personal selfishness, “ Personal liberty.” There 
is everything selfish in that cry. It means, to the men who utter it, liberty to 
destroy themselves, and in doing so to destroy the morals and peace of society. 

In society the watchword of all save the slaves of that evil triumvirate, 
Appetite, Lust, and Greed, will be “ Popular liberty,” with liberty for the person 
only so far as it is consistent with the liberties of the populace. There can be 

NO SUCH THING IN CIVILIZED SOCIETY AS “ PERSONAL LIBERTY,” IN THE SENSE THE 
PRODIGALS AND POLITICIANS USE THAT TERM. 

Even in the wilderness, a hundred miles from the nearest savage tribe, and 
beyond the range of all civil law, the reveler cannot indulge in impurity with 
impunity. Even there, for his own good, his liberty is encircled with law—the 
law of God, written in his body, a law from which he cannot escape. Even 
there, “ Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap. He that soweth to 
the flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption.” Even in the solitude of the wilder¬ 
ness the tippler shall find that he who sows an act reaps a tendency, and he who 
sows a tendency reaps a habit, and he who sows a habit reaps a character, and 
he who sows a character reaps a destiny. Nowhere in all God's universe is there 
personal liberty to do wrong with impunity. The only true personal liberty is 
liberty to choose among various ways of doing right. 

But, so far as civil law is concerned, the man who will go away by himself 
into the wilderness may have personal liberty to keep a stench at his door, be¬ 
cause he is not interfering with any neighbor’s liberty to smell only sweet odors; 
he may make night hideous with drunken rage and revelry, because he is not 
interfering with any neighbor’s liberty to rest in peace. But when this solitary 


16 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


concludes that the protection and fellowship of society is more to be desired than 
his unbounded liberty to destroy himself, just as a man exchanges his i6o-acre 
claim on the frontier for a corner lot in the city, this recluse surrenders his 
wilderness liberty for the smaller but more desirable liberty of civilized society. 
Such exchanges make up the history of civilization. Personal liberty in society 
is an ample circle, smoothly bounded on all sides by laws that protect the liberties 
of others; a circle in which one can do what he pleases, if he pleases to do what 
is just; in which he can do what he likes, if he likes to do what is right. The 
man who has in himself that equity which whispers all true laws to the legislator, 
and all right interpretations of them to the judge, and which silently leads every 
good citizen, in whatever land he travels, to obey all true laws without having 
seen them—that equity is a centripetal force that keeps the just man in his orbit, 
inside of the circle of his personal liberty; keeps him from even desiring to 
infringe on his neighbor’s rights and liberties. 

True Personal Liberty. 

The man who has no will to do ill is the only man who has true personal 
liberty. Willing obedience to law is liberty, the liberty of the railway engine 
that leaps along the fixed rails having no desire to jump the track. 

During the first year at Chautauqua, on the night of the feast of lights a 
very large toy balloon, in rising, was caught in the upper branches of a tall tree, 
and as the multitude watched breathlessly there seemed to be a battle between 
the invisible force that sought to lift the balloon heavenward and the tree that 
seemed a giant dragging it back to earth, the old battle between light and dark¬ 
ness, between the flesh and the spirit. At last light triumphed, and the balloon, 
untorn, pulled itself free from the last earthly entanglement, and rose into the 
freedom of the upper air, watched eagerly as it moved upward, until it shone as 
a heavenly star—a picture of him who obeys all laws freely, because he loves 
God with all his heart and his neighbor as himself. In the words of George 
McDonald, “If God’s will is our law, then we are but a kind of noble slaves; 
but if God’s will is our will, then are we his free children.” 

On the background of such true personal liberty the so-called “ personal 
liberty ” of the saloonist and the sensualist, and the “ personal liberty ” of those 
who desire to enrich themselves by supplying others with vices, is seen to be 
not personal liberty at all, but its opposite—personal slavery. 

True and False Americans. 

It might fairly be expected that Americans would know something about 
liberty, after all they have paid in blood and treasure to secure it; but the cry of 
“ personal liberty ” is usually spoken with a strong foreign accent. When we 
speak of foreigners, let us never forget to make it understood that we do not 
mean foreigners who are Americans in spirit. The Irishman who had sampled 
our country for a month and declared he “ had determined to take it for his 
native land” could have done just that. There are many Irish, especially 
Scotch-Irish, who are Americans in spirit. Most of those who come to us from 
all parts of the British empire are but new loads of the Mayflower stock. Of 
course, we never think of Canadians as foreigners. They are the Americans of 
Americans in all the original moral implications of that word. What New Eng¬ 
land was, Canada is. 

Right to Act Within the Law. 

One of the very best definitions of personal liberty was given by 
Rev. Dr. Oerter, speaking to and for a thousand Germans of the better 
sort, gathered in Brooklyn a few years since in behalf of law and order. 


WHY RATIFY NATIONAL CONSTITUTIONAL PROHIBITION? 17 


He said, in substance, that personal liberty is the right to act without 

MOLESTATION WITHIN THE LIMITS OF LAW. 

sort VP*I1 such “ personal liberty” that the foreigners of the baser 

join t^at vel ^ on reachmg our shores. And many recreant sons of America 
ibertv “personal liberty” to destroy social 

triS^hv Ihlrh reminds me of the shrewd 

knew^Lrthe^IWF^^®®’ destroyed the liberties of Egypt. He 

knew that the E^ptians worshiped sacred cats; that an Egyptian would not 
k.l a cat to save hj^s wife or his life. And therefore he equi^ed his^rmy not 
with swords and shields, but with swords and cats—the latter taking the^place 
of the ^ of musical instruments. The tumultuous wa^iling 

whh^n P?’®” sod® unnerved the Egyptians as soon as the Persian army cam! 
within hearing. The Egyptians saw they could not kill an invader without 
xi .surrendered their families and their country to the foe 

Aafthet.7 '' iu our own land. God forbid, patriots forbidi 

that the last part should be repeated. But the first part is being repeated before 
our very eyes. Hundreds of thousands of foreigners who come here, not for 
freedom to worship God, as our fathers did, but for freedom to raise the devil 
march to the attack of the very institutions that have made this a good countn^ 
to emigrate to, the lack of which have made their own lands good places to 
emigrate from, and, as they lift their swords to attack our liberties, thev raise as 
a shield to paralyze our defense our sacred word “ liberty,” knowing that to manv 
Americans liberty is only a superstition, a goddess, indeed, that must not be re¬ 
fused even human sacrifices, her name a word to be feared as a spell even when 
Uttered by her foes. > wiicij 

The most absurd element of the situation, which would be a comedy were 
It not also a tragedy, is that these baser sort of foreigners fresh from foreign 
despotism, who never saw liberty in their lives, and would not know it if they saw 
It, present themselves as self-appointed professors of liberty to teach Americans 
how to be free. They cannot teach us anything about liberty; but we need to 
study It anew for ourselves in the new conditions of this age of cities that we 
may stand firmly and together for our American institutions, which are not onlv 
consistent with liberty, but essential to it. ^ 

No Liberty to Do Wrong, 

The “ personal liberty ” of the liquor seller to sell his maddening poison of 
fte dens of infamy to sell yet more deadly vices, on any day, means liberty to 
break the hearts of mothers and damn the lives of sons by the score The 
“ personal liberty ” of the drunkard to make himself a temporary lunatic inter- 
feres with the liberties of men and women and children wherever he exercises 
that liberty. The law abridges no man^s personal liberty except his liberty 
to do wrong, and that only in the defense of the liberties of others. ^ 

One of the best up-to-date answers to the personal liberty fallacy is that 
of United States Senator Wesley L. Jones, which is, in part, as follows: 

No one has a personal right to do that which is injurious to the individual 
the home, and the State. It is one of the fundamental principles of a republican 
form of government that the right of the individual is subordinate to the right 
of the many. No individual citizen has any right to do what the State or the 
public deems injurious. The question of temperance does not concern the in¬ 
dividual alone, it concerns the family, the public health, posterity, humanity and 
the State. The strength of the race, the happiness of the home and the welfare 
of the State are at stake. Governmental authorities have not hesitated for much 



18 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


less than this to restrict the actions of men and fhe so-called liberty of the 
citizens. We cannot burn our own house. Why? Because it is against the 
public good. Why then should we be permitted to burn out our own lives and 
at the same time injure those about us and in fact endanger them and deprive 
them of their own liberty? We cannot spit on the sidewalk or on transportation 
vehicles. Why? For the public good. Why then should we be permitted to 
drink that which endangers our neighbor and may transmit seeds of death to our 
posterity? No man can go to the drug store and buy a dose of arsenic to send 
himself to Kingdom Come although to do so might greatly benefit his family, the 
State and, so far as any one can see, himself. Why? Because of the public 
good, which is superior to the rights of the individual. We do not allow any 
one to sell whiskey to the soldier in uniform. The soldiers are not objecting 
and every one knows that this is a good thing to do. We quarantine individuals 
for diseases that are contagious and we compel vaccination in the interest of the 
public health. No man has the right to sell that which injures his neighbor and 
weakens the State and no man has the right to use that which injures himself 
and endangers others. To prohibit such things is real liberty and the State 
which fails to do so is neglecting its duty. Individual responsibility owes a duty 
to self, family, friends, and the State that is not discharged by license, reck¬ 
lessness, and unchecked selfishness. Prohibition is the first essential of real 
personal liberty. The user of alcohol as a beverage in the light of the facts 
is the destroyer of personal liberty.” 

How can we better picture the true liberty that emancipation from the 
drink curse will bring to the nation than in the words of Abraham Lincoln in 
his address on Washington’s Birthday, 1842? After describing our deliverance 
from a foreign despotism in Washington’s day, he turns to contemplate our 
anticipated deliverance from the thrall of appetite: 

" Turn now to the temperance revolution. In it we shall find a stronger bondage 
broken, a viler slavery manumitted, a greater tyrant deposed—in it, more of want 
supplied, more disease healed, more sorrow assuaged. By it no orphans starving, 
no widows weeping; by it, none wounded in feeling, none injured in interest. Even 
tfie dram-maker and dr2im-seller will have glided into other occupations so gradually 
as never to have felt the change, and will stand ready to join all others in the universal 
song of gladness. And what a noble ally this is to the cause of politick freedom! 
With such an aid its march cannot fail to be on and on, till evepr son of earth shall 
drink in rich fruits the sorrow-quenching draughts of perfect liberty! Happy day, 
when — all appetites controlled, all passion subdued, all matter subjugated — mind, 
all-conquering mind, shall live and move, the monarch of the world! Glorious con¬ 
summation! Hail, fall of fury! Reign of reason, all hail! 

“ And when the victory shall be complete—when there shall be neither a slave nor 
a drunkard on the earth—^how proud the title of that land which may truly claim to 
be both the birthplace and the cradle of both those revolutions that shall have ended 
in victory!. .How nobly distinguished that people who shall have planted and nurtured 
to maturity both the political and moral freedom of their species!” 

** Did they finish the fight that day 
When the Liberty Bell was rung? 

Did they silence the noise of war. 

When liberty’s triumph was sung? 

Was Freedom made sovereign indeed 
When the old bell pealed to the world 
That the reign of oppression had ceased 
And the banner of Freedom unfurled? 

A BATTLE HAS WAGED SINCE THE WORLD WAS NEW ; 

The battle is on— God calleth for you.” 




I SeriNa 


i United States | 

»4 








WHY WAR PROHIBITION? 

- -- m m mm 

Up-to-the-Minute Facts and Reasons why the manu- I! Italv ' 

facture, transportation, and sale of all alcoholic beverages ^ I 

should be prohibited by all beligerants for the period of ^ 
the war and demobilization. 



HON. JOSEPHUS DANIELS, 

Secretary of the Navy. 

The raison d’etat of war prohibition is thus stated (pp. 
234-237) by Hon. Josephus Daniels, Secretary of the Navy: 

“Congress has passed a law saying that under no conditions can 
any man sell a drop of intoxicating liquor to a man in uniform in 
America, and has prescribed heayy penalties if that law is violated. 
It is a wise law, and time has demonstrated its wisdom. In my judg¬ 
ment all who are building ships and making torpedoes are just as 
ready to make a sacrifice of their habits, or of their tastes, as the 
men in uniform, and there is no more reason why you should say a 
man who is going to fight should not be allowed to hare a drink than 
why you should say that the civilian population all over the country 
should put the same restraint upon themselves during the war. We 
ought not to use a bushel of wheat for anything except a prime 
necessity, whether it is drink or eating; we ought not to use a car in 
America for anything except to win the war; we ought not to use a 
man for anything in America except to win the war. And every naan 
employed in the industry of producing alcoholic drinks is employed 
in a business that is not necessary, to put it at the very best. In my 
judgment it is a business that lessens efificiency.” 




DomMiicsm | 
RepubKc I 


Costa Rica 


Twenty-eight flags against four! That includes all nations which 
have broken diplomatic relations with any of Central Powers. They 
are not all fighting, but they must all fight if needed, if only to save 
themselves from the Huns. We have not only right but might on our 
side. With more food, fuel, money and men we shall win out if we 
hold out. But we shall win sooner and with less slaughter if we lay 
aside every weight and the sin that God perhaps intends shall be 
banished before he will give victory. 




Czeck Nib'on 


1 Hedjaz 

: i 








































































20 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION 


Why War Prohibition? 

Everywhere the argument for war prohibition is that there are ten lines of battle, 
one “ over there,” nine “ over here,” that need to be at full strength, not doing their 
“ bit ” but their best, one hundred per cent American and one hundred per cent 
efficient, to insure the winning of the war; all of which battle lines are reduced at least 
ten per cent by the effect of drink. These ten battle lines are: the soldier line, the 
munitions line, the fuel line, the transportation line, the ship building line, the food 
line, the money line, the voting line, the home line, the church line. 


1 . WAR PROHIBITION IS NEEDED TO PROTECT MEN IN UNIFORM 
WHEN OUT OF “ MORAL ZONES ON LEAVE. 

A large number of great witnesses can be quoted to show that drink is the 
foe, abstinence the friend, of soldierly efficiency; and the pertinence of quotations 
following from famous generals in support of that proposition is that the legis¬ 
lation already enacted, and approved by the U. S. Supreme Court, forbidding 
the selling of intoxicating beverages to soldiers, though efficient, is not sufficient. 
Secretary Daniels has repeatedly referred (p. 235) to the liquor dealers" dis¬ 
regard of official appeals to observe this law, in Newport and Mare Island, for 
which reason moral zones were established in those places. 

The Brewers’ Journal, July, 1918, p. 315, says: “Jacksonville has voted, by 
more than 1,000 majority, against saloon licenses, mainly because of complaints 
from the commander at nearby Army Training Camp Johnson, saloonkeepers 
having barefacedly violated the rule against selling to soldiers.*^ (Italics ours.) 

Soldiers go everywhere on leave and on furlough, and therefore all “ wet ” 
towns imperil their efficiency by open doors to drink. Only a moral zone that is 
nation-wide is wide enough to fully protect them. 

It is common to speak of alcohol’s impairment of military efficiency only as 
it affects the soldier, but the very reason why Secretary Daniels made the ocean 
“ dry ” for officers of the Navy, by exending Secretary Long’s order to them 
was that a fuddled brain is still more dangerous in a commander, whether on 
sea or land. The editor will cite on that point a part of what he said on drink 
as a menace to military efficiency in Senate hearing of May 9, 1917: 

Gen, O. O. Howard gives the following among other instances of defeat through 
drink in the American War for the Union; 

“ In one of our great battles we suffered defeat, and many of us have believed that 
the mistake which caused the defeat was due to an excess of whiskey drunk by the 
officer in command. I had the testimony from an officer who was with him that 
pitchers of liquor were brought to his table, and that he and those around him drank 


The editor prepared a previous brief of the case for war prohibition, which was published in Con¬ 
gressional Record for June 18^ 1917, p. 4072. The case as it stood at that time is more fully stated in 
the first hearing on war prohibition, on May 9, 1917, before Senate Committee on Agriculture. Before 
same Committee there were hearings for both sides on June 17, 18, 25, 1918. The page references in 
this brief, unless otherwise stated, refer to volume of last-named hearings. Other up-to-date discussions 
of war prohibition may be found in " The Wooden Horse,” by Deets Pickett, and ” Why Prohibition,” 
by Charles Stelzle, both published in spring of 1918. Apply for lists of prohibition literature to Inter. 

^ve., s. e., Washington, D, C., American Anti-Saloon I/:ague, Wester- 
Tille, Ohm, N. W. C. T. U., Evanston, Ill., Methodist Board of Temperance, Prohibition and Public 
Morals, 204 Pa. Ave., s. e. Washington, D. C, Presbyterian Temperance Board, Columbia-Bank BuUd- 
ing, Pittsburgh, Pa.; and National Temperance Society, 272 Fourth Avenue, New York City 




WHY WAR PROHIBITION? 


21 


ms freely from them as if they contained only water. The orders the commander gave 
were the direct opposite from what he would have given had he not been suddenly 
confused by drink. A heavy loss of men and material and a dreadful defeat for our 
cause was the result.” 

Even Horner, ten centures before Christ, knew that wine was harmful to a general’s 
body and brain, as witness the following dialogue between Hector’s mother and her 
hero son: 

” Stay till I bring the cup with Bacchus crowned, 

Then with a plenteous draught refresh thy soul 
And draw new spirits from the generous bowl.’ 

‘ Far hence be Bacchus’s gifts!’ Hector rejoined: 

Inflaming wine, pernicious to mankind, 

Unnerves the limbs and dulls the noble mind: 

Let chiefs abstain and spare the sacred juice 
To sprinkle to the gods—’tis fitter use.” 

In Bible times we have another warning of defeat by drink when “ Benhadad was 
drinking^ himself drunk in the pavilions, he and the kings, the thirty-two kings that 
helped him.” These drunken generals were defeated by the sober ” young men of the 
princes of the provinces” (Kings xx, 13-21). Daniel v tells of another defeat of a 
drunken King. 

Mr. Wayne B. Wheeler quotes (p. 112) following great military leaders 
as witnesses that abstinence is essential to the efficiency of the soldier. While 
reading them it will be well to recall the remark of Bainbridge Colby at the 
Senate hearing, “ It’s not teetotalism but fighters we want now.” The experts 
on fighters know that “ booze fighters ” are not of much use to fight anything else. 

Earl Roberts: 

Thirteen thousand abstainers are equal to 15,000 nonabstainers. Give me a teetotal 
army and I will lead it anywhere. 

Sir John French: 

Abstinence and self-control make a man more serviceable. If men want to see 
regiments, battalions, squadrons, and batteries, smart and efficient, if they have at heart 
the fame of the glorious regiment to which they belong, they must practice these great 
qualities of self-control and self-sacrifice. 

Gen. Methuen: 

I appeal to these gallant men who represent this great Empire to act their part as 
England expects them to do; and throw away from them the vile curse of drink, so 
that they may make themselves fit in body and nerve to face a foe that is as courageous 
as he is brutal in war. 

Lieut. Gen. Sir Reginald Hart: 

As an officer, I support temperance because I know that officers and men who 
avoid drink are physically and mentally efficient, their nerves are stronger, they march 
better, there is far less sickness and crime, and their power of resistance is strengthened. 

Admiral Sir J. R. Jellico: 

As regards straight shooting it is everyone’s experience that abstinence is necessary 
for efficiency. By careful and prolonged tests, the shooting efficiency of the men was 
proven to be 30 per cent worse after the rum ration than before. 

Law approved May 18, 1917, said: “It shall be unlawful to sell any intoxicating 
liquor, including beer, ale or wine, to any officer or member of the military forces 
while in uniform.” (Words “ or give ” were cut out after “ sell.”) 

Gen. John F. O’Ryan, in address 37,000 American troops leaving for France: “Our 
job is to whip the enemy hard and with the least loss to ourselves. In training our 
military machine to do this we must eliminate backlash, rattles and useless loads. We 
must have every part healthy and dependable; no part defective, diseased or obsolete. 
This can not be if we are to permit ‘ booze ’ in any form in our military machine. 
Alcohol, whether you call it beer, wine, whiskey or any other name, is a breeder of 
inefficiency. While it affects men differently the results are the same, in that all 
affected by it cease for the time to be normal. Some become forgetful, others quarrel¬ 
some. Some become noisy, some get sick, some get sleepy; others have their passions 
greatly stimulated. When you stop to consider the thousands in a division, do you not 



22 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


Allies' Stand on Drink No Argument for Us. 

This is the appropriate place to say that the appeal of many opposers of 
war prohibition to the customs of Great Britain and France in giving, the 
first a rum ration, the second a wine ration, to their soldiers, is a remarkable 
case of talking without thinking. The American soldier is already under prohibi¬ 
tion, and there is no proposal pending to change it. Long ago we had a “ ^og 
ration." Will any of the Senators or Representatives who cite the British 
“ rum ration " as an argument, move to restore our “ grog ration "? We had a 
beer canteen in the last century. There are no bills in Congress for its repeal. 
The subject before Congress is whether we will protect the efficiency of industrial 
workers, just as we have protected the efficiency of our soldiers, since the drink¬ 
ing of war workers is just as perilous to our cause in slowing up supplies. 

We esteem our brave Allies, and in some things we may learn from them, 
but in temperance progress both France and Britain are nearly a century 
behind us, neither of them having reached the stand taken by our churches and 
reformers, with practical unanimity, in 1836 , at a national convention in Sara¬ 
toga, namely, that distilled, malt and vinous liquors, all being alcoholic, are 
equally dangerous, and should all be barred out by a teetotal pledge. Since then 
all these drinks have usually been treated alike in American restrictive and 
prohibitory laws. 

However, it should be said with emphasis in refuting those who say as an 
argument against war prohibition, that European belligerents have not enacted 
such a law, that all the belligerents in this war have officially recognized, from 
their entrance into it, that drink is a foe in the rear; and all have either pro¬ 
hibited it—so Russia and Roumania—or restricted it—so Britain, France, Italy, 
Germany, Austria. Indeed all of the beligerants have really reduced its use 
among their civil population for the war period more than we, despite our higher 
standards and experience of prohibition. In France (p. 295 ) and still more in 
Britain there are many war prohibitionists, but the leaders feel—we think mis¬ 
takenly in Great Britain at least—that even the war emergency would not make 
sufficient appeal to sacrifice to enable the Government to enact and enforce a 
suspension of what has been for centuries the daily habit of nearly all the people, 
rich and poor. The American people are not daily drinkers to any such extent 
and so there is no such obstacle here. The words of the Kaiser in 1911 , “The 
nation that drinks the least alcohol will win the next war, for modern war re¬ 
quires sound nerves and a cool head," come back ominously as we read month 
after month in the Brewers' Journal that Germany since February, 1918 , has 
brewed no real beer, and Austria very little, as it is a choiqe of beer or bread. 
In any case the conditions “ over here " and “ over there " are so different that 

see how vital to efficiency is the elimination of liquor? How can a division of troops 
be ever ready—ever up on the bit to drive ahead or to thrust the enemy’s drive, if 
through the presence of this insidious evil some soldiers forget their orders, or become 
noisy when silence is essential, fall asleep when every faculty should be alert? ” 

Enquiry at War Department on July 20, 1918, as to whether the repeal of General 
Biddle’s order allowing men in uniform to drink liquors at home or when “bona fide 
guests ’’ had been followed by repeal of similar order of Gen. Pershing allowing our 
soldiers in France to “ buy or receive as a gift wine or beer,’’ brought reply in the 
negative. 

In The Pioneer, Toronto, July 12, 1918, p. 3, statistics are given from Captain 
Gorden Bates, Officer in charge of Venerial Diseases, Military District, No. 2 (Canada), 
who has made a careful tabulation of results obtained from examination of 900 venerially 
affected men, in various hospitals, military and civil, in the United States and Canada. 
Of those from U. S., 50 per cent showed alcoholic relations, and of these, 6 .5% were 
from prohibition areas and 93.5% from license areas. 

LATEST.—SURGEON GENERAL GORGAS REPORTS VENEREAL RATE 
OF AMERICAN ARMY IN U. S. IS 21 PER 1,000 YEARLY; IN FRANCE, 47.2. 



WHY WAR PROHIBITION? 


23 


the appeal to the customs of our Allies is wholly irrelevant. We are leading, not 

following, in the worldwide war on drink.^ 

II. WAR PROHIBITION IS NEEDED NO LESS AMONG MEN WHO 
PRODUCE MUNITIONS THAN AMONG THOSE WHO USE THEM. 

Mr. John A. McSparran, Master Pennsylvania State Grange, states the 
argument for keeping drink from munition workers thus (p. i68) : 

As citizens, we farmers are ashamed of the position we are placed in in the treat¬ 
ment of our soldier boys with respect to booze. The soldier boy has given up his 
social life as well as his business to serve his country, and the taking of the social glass 
from the soldier is frank admission on the part of the Government that its effects arc 
deleterious; but it must be remembered that back of every soldier boy are two other 
boys: one preparing food and the other munitions. They do not have to g;ive up their 
social life or their business, but their failure to meet the severest test of efficiency may 
make the soldier fail, and hence it is a most cowardly proposition to take booze from 
the soldier and allow the sheltered civilian to cause his ghastly murder on the field of 
battle because of lack of supplies. 

In former times people used to speak of an army going to war. Very 
early in this colossal conflict, leaders began to say that the whole nation must 
go to war, every one doing not his hit ” hut his best. We have discovered 
there dive really ten lines of battle, every one of which must he one hundred per 
cent patriotic and one hundred per cent efficient', the soldier line, the munitions 
line, the fuel line, the transportation line, the building line, the food line, the 
money line, the voting line, the home line, the church line. 

The need of organizing all these varied forces for efficiency by abstinence 
and prohibition was strikingly expressed in Chicago on June 12, 1918, at the 
annual meeting of the American Medical Association, the world’s greatest 
organization of physicians and surgeons, by the new president Dr. Arthur Dean 
Bevan, who advocated war prohibition in outlining the policy of the association, 
over 7,000 doctors being in attendance. Dr. Bevan said in part: 

“ In this crisis when we and our allies are fighting not only for ourselves but also 
for humanity and civilization, we must organize the entire nation in the most efficient 
possible way, and this cannot be done without eliminating drink 

“ Each member of the medical profession as an individual, each county medical 
society, each state medic»l society should take an active part in the propaganda against 
drink, and secure national prohibition not years from now but when it is so badly needed 
and will accomplish so much good not only for our boys in khaki and in blue, but for 
the nation in arms.” 

The Association does not adopt resolution but endorsed this plea for war 
prohibition by such thunders of applause as left no doubt its President had 
faithfully expressed its views. 

President Wilson said in June, 1918, that we are as likely to lose the war 
from interruptions of industrial work at home as by anything that may happen 
on the battlefield. He had strikes especially in mind, but Lloyd George, at the 
very outset of the war, pointed out a more chronic and far more serious inter- 

* Washington Post, June 17, 1918, reported Mr. Daniel Poling, Associate President 
of Society of Christian Endeavor, had brought home a letter Lorn Premier Lloyd 
George, in which he said: “I am following with great interest the war restrictions on 
alcohol actually enforced and those under consideration in the United States. We 
have ourselves not been neglectful of the necessities imposed by war. We have stopped 
entirely the manufacture of spirits; we have cut down the brewing of beer by more 
than two thirds and the hours during which it can be sold to less than one-third. Should 
the exigencies of war necessitate further restrictions, we shall follow with interest 
your campaign for the enforcement of war prohibition in the United States of America.* ** 

On Jan. 31, 1917, Associated Press information from Zurich, Switzerland, was that 
General Gazette for Brewers reported supply of barley for German breweries would 
be stopped and whole brewing industry brought to a standstill, and not even beer for 
German army allowed. See further testimony on munitions, p. 29. 



24 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


1 


ruption. Great Britain, previously relying on a big navy, had suddenly sent 
its little army, poorly equipped, to help Belgium and France hold back the 
almost resistless army of Germany, which was abundantly supplied with the 
most deadly modern instruments of slaughter. British soldiers were slain by 
thousands for lack of ammunition. To speed up production of munitions 
British workmen were given double wages. But many of them had learned no 
use for extra money save to multiply drinks and drunks. Lloyd George told 
Parliament they were losing one hundred and fifty thousand man-power a day 
in the munitions works. That was the very fact that made him say: We are 
FIGHTING Germany, Austria and Drink, and so far as I can see, the great¬ 
est OF THESE IS Drink. I have a growing conviction, based on accumulat¬ 
ing EVIDENCE THAT NOTHING BUT ROOT AND BRANCH METHODS CAN BE OF THE 
SLIGHTEST AVAIL IN DEALING WITH THE EVIL. I BELIEVE IT IS THE GENERAL FEEL¬ 
ING THAT IF WE ARE TO SETTLE WITH GeRMAN MILITARISM, WE MUST FIRST OF 
ALL SETTLE WITH DrINK."" 

We may well consider the power of Drink not only in killing efficiency but 
also in dominating politics, in the light of that story —and the sequel —that even 
Lloyd George did not dare play St. George to that dragon. Some slight limita¬ 
tions of the amount of precious foodstuffs the distillers and brewers might con¬ 
sume; some shortening of hours for bar rooms, was all he dared to require. 
The story should nerve our arm to reenforce British war prohibitionists and 
President Poincare, General Joffre, and others of France who made almost 
identical statements as to the drink foe, and whose Government made a like 
surrender to its mighty power in politics. The liquor power has been almost 
as powerful in American politics, and it is still powerful in many cities, and in 
some wetStates, and was influential enough in national politics in 1917 to 
make the United States Senate swiftly reverse its prohibition, first of beermak¬ 
ing, then of whiskey withdrawals for beverage use. But the doom of Drink is 
written by the hand of God in war’s “ curtain of fire,” not only because drink 
wastes efficiency and food and fuel and money, but especially because the liquor 
dealer’ associations have attempted so insolently to lord it in politics. 

III. WAR PROHIBITION IS MOST IMPERATIVELY NEEDED TO 
CONSERVE FUEL. 

Even seasoned prohibitionists, in and out of Congress, who know well that 
the supreme reason for war prohibition is the damage done to man-power of 
soldiers and industrial workers by the saloon, fearing to be misunderstood, have 
joined with amateurs in treating war prohibition as if the main thing to do is to 
stop the waste of food in the manufacture of drink. We were loudly called 

TO RETURN TO THE ANTI-SALOON ATTITUDE, UNDER WHICH WE HAD WON ALL OUR 
VICTORIES, BY THE UNANIMOUS PETITION SENT TO THE PRESIDENT BY SEVENTEEN 
HUNDRED COAL OPERATORS, IN NATIONAL CONVENTION ASSEMBLED, AT PITTSBURGH, 
Oct. 21-23, 1917, ASKING FOR FIVE MILE PROHIBITION ZONES ABOUT COAL MINES, 
AS NO LESS essential TO WINNING THE WAR THAN SUCH ZONES ABOUT MILITARY 
CAMPS. THIS PETITION WAS FORTIFIED BY THEIR EXPERT AND UNANIMOUS 
OPINION THAT “THE OUTPUT OF COAL IN THE UNITED STATES IS DECREASED 20 TO 
30 PER CENT BY DRINKING AMONG MINERS.” PROHIBITION WOULD HAVE ADDED, 
AT THE MINIMUM ESTIMATE, ONE HUNDRED AND THIRTY MILLIONS TONS OF COAL 
PER YEAR—THE ANNUAL OUTPUT BEING SIX HUNDRED AND FIFTY MILLIONS OF 
TONS. THIS INCREASE WOULD HAVE PROVIDED THE ONE HUNDRED MILLION TONS 
INCREASE DECLARED BY THE FUEL ADMINISTRATION TO BE ABSOLUTELY NECES¬ 
SARY FOR THE SUCCEEDING YEAR, WITH A WELCOME BONUS ALL OF WHICH WOULD 



WHY WAR PROHIBITION? 


25 


HAVe BEEN USED. THE COSTLY NATION WIDE EXHORTATIONS TO HOMES 

and schools and churches and mills to skimp themselves all the year 

TO AVOID A FUEL CRISIS WOULD SO HAVE BEEN RENDERED UNNECESSARY. 

It should be noted that this warning call for closing of bar rooms about 
mines came long enough before the first great fuel crisis to enable the Fuel 
Administration to save sufficient coal, at the minimum estimate of ten millions of 
tons a month, to prevent any munition plants from being closed down or any 
transports being kept waiting in harbors for coal—provided that all transportation 
of liquors had also been stopped to meet this emergency. 

Instead of such preventive action the crisis came with heatless days'' that 
closed churches and schools, also mills, with the loss of millions in wages as well 
as profits, and, worst of all, suspension of war work when Britain and France, 
with their “ backs against the wall,” were crying to us in agony, “ For God’s 
sake, America, hurry.” 

After the crisis had passed, brewers, at their own request, were ordered to 
cut off thirty per cent of their normal coal supply, and later, fifty per cent, by the 
Fuel Administration. But the output of beer did not have any such proportion 
of decrease, nor have we seen any proof that the brewers, who are shown to 
be habitual lawbreakers in the last of these briefs (“Why No License?”) have 
been held to those reductions by any vigilant law enforcement agency. 

On July 12, 1918, the coal operators again asked for the closing of 

SALOONS about MINES, THROUGH THE NATIONAL CoAL ASSOCIATION, IN A LETTER 
SENT TO EVERY SENATOR AND REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGERSS, WHICH SHOULD 
HAVE BROUGHT INSTANT ACTION TO THAT END BY CONGRESS, AS THE PRESIDENT 
THEN HAD NO CONTROL OF “ SALE,” BUT ONLY OF THE “ MANUFACTURE ” OF DRINK. 

“ Nation Must Go Dry to Get Fuel Supply.” 

The National Coal Association, represents bituminous coal operators whose 
annual production is four hundred million tons. It adopted following statement: 

“ A definite program for increased coal production placed formally before 
the United States Fuel Administration as the best thought of the industry, carries 
with it the recommendation that nation-wide prohibition be put into effect at 
once. The coal production committee of the national association, which formu¬ 
lated the program, also has addressed a letter to each member of Congress, 
advising him of the recommendation. 

“ In the opinion of a representative committee of operators, which comprises 
in its membership delegates from virtually every large coal-producing field in 
the nation, the country cannot have both booze and sufficient coal this winter. 

“ This conclusion was reached unanimously after thoro and painstaking 
investigation by the committee. The National Coal Association is informed that 
the conclusion is not only the judgment of the operators, hut is concurred in hy 
Frank Farrington, president of the United Mine Workers of America for the 
State of Illinois. 

Following is the text of the committee’s recommendation: 

“ Regardless of political affiliations of the members of the association, and 
leaving out of consideration the moral issues involved, and basing its opinion 
entirely on economic and patriotic grounds, the committee unanimously and 
unqualiHedly believes that national prohibition for the period of the war is 
absolutely necessary to make effective this or any other plan for increased coal 
production. 

" A comparison of the records of production of mines in wet and dry terri- 


2« 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


tories, furnished ample proof of the need of prohibition. The various instances 
cited to you need not be repeated here, but they typify the experience of opera¬ 
tors thruout the entire country.*' 

A. R. Hamilton, chairman of the committee, made this statement on the 
committee’s action: 

“ The committee feels that the drinking evil has become so rampant 

IN THE MINING COMMUNITIES THAT ITS COMPLETE ELIMINATION IS FUNDA¬ 
MENTALLY NECESSARY IN THE EFFORT TO SPEED UP THE MINES SUFFICIENTLY TO 
GET THE 100,000,000 ADDITIONAL TONS OF COAL THIS COUNTRY WILL REQUIRE THIS 
YEAR. It IS NOW UP TO CONGRESS TO MAKE A CLEAN-CUT CHOICE BETWEEN BOOZE 
FOR THE MINING COMMUNITIES AND COAL FOR THE WAR AND THE PUBLIC.” 

It is an amazing contrast to the courage and celerity with which our soldiers 
meet emergencies in France, that, with this unanswerable proof of the impera¬ 
tive necessity of immediate war prohibition, at least so far as temporary closing 
of saloons about coal mines, just placed in the hands of the Fuel Administration 
and of the President, and with the same appeal in the hands of Senators and 
Representatives just when the revised war prohibition amendment that was drawn 
by the International Reform Bureau and Senator George W. Norris, which would 
have ended the sale of liquors with the year 1918, was on the docket of Congress 
as the next legislation to be voted on. Congress agreed to recess by semi-weekly 
adjournments from about the middle of July to the 26th of August, during which 
time at least ten million tons of coal could have been saved by making the mines 
dry, which would have provided for the nine million tons shortage at that time. 

At last, on August 29, 1918, the Senate voted to put on Agricultural bill the 
war prohibition amendment with six months’ delay in its application (to July 
I, 1919), yielded as a compromise on President’s request to postpone war pro¬ 
hibition to January i, 1920—the time when it is reasonably sure constitutional pro¬ 
hibition would be at hand. It was nearly a week before the Senate finally passed 
the bill, and then the House, after its own Agricultural Committee had reported 
the prohibition amendment, kept it sidetracked a week more while it passed the 
revenue bill, which contained a billion liquor tax, which, in effect, however in¬ 
tended, could be nothing less than the biggest of all bribes to spare the traffic—a 
bribe that would jeopardize both war prohibition and the ratification of the 
amendment. 

While this prohibition amendment was suffering suspicious delays, the Fuel 
Administration issued an order that breweries could have no more coal after 
December i, 1918, until further orders,” apparently going Congress ” one 
better ” by stopping brewing in December instead of May. But the suspen¬ 
sion was no doubt an attempt to prevent or mitigate the fuel crisis, which, how¬ 
ever, it would probably not affect materially, as it was too late to bring any con¬ 
siderable increase for 1918; and furthermore it was probable that most breweries, 
with all their warnings and opportunities, had laid in a supply of coal for the 
winter, or at least the previously allowed fifty per cent of their supply. 

As this action would not meet the emergency proclaimed by National Coal 
Association on July 12, 1918, and by the President on August ii, when he 

DECLARED THE SCARCITY OF COAL OUR MOST SERIOUS DANGER, with no remedy of¬ 
fered save an exhortation to coal operators and employees to increase the output, 
the International Reform Bureau sought to amend the Kellogg resolution, adopted 
by the Senate September 6, 1918, giving President power to stop sale of liquors 
in unlimited zones about coal mines and munition plants, the passage of which 
urged by Minnesota and Wisconsin legislators ostensibly only to suppress liquor 
selling in the village of Oliver, Wis., incorporated to prey on munition workers 


WHY WAR PROHIBITION? 


27 


of the dry cities of Duluth and Superior. It seemed to be too small a reform for 
Congress to attempt when the full peril faced the whole country and could be 
averted by an amendment making the resolution mandatory at least to the extent 
of closing saloons about coal mines for October and November. There was no 
doubt House would adopt such an amendment if it was brought to vote or the 
same provision in a separate bill. And so moderate a remedy for so great a 
peril, even the Anti-Saloon League’s legislative agent who opposed the amend¬ 
ment admitted would be concurred in, without doubt, by the Senate if sent there 
by the House. Approval of this proposal to close saloons about coal mines sixty 
days by a mandatory provision, presented to House Judiciary Committee by the 
International Reform Bureau, was moved by its chairman, Hon. E. Y. Webb, 
M. C., House prohibition leader, who read many supporting petitions of church 
temperance boards and other temperance bodies, but on account of the opposition 
of Senator Lenroot of Wisconsin and Congressman Miller of Minnesota and be¬ 
cause the Anti-Saloon League’s legislative agent did not favor it, it got no other 
support in that Committee. The same amendment was urged before House 
Rules Committee, none of whose members supported it in the face of the same 
opposition. 

These facts about fuel are noted that if “ heatless days ” come, responsibility 
may be justly distributed. 

When this brief went to press (Sept. i6, 1918), it was confidently expected 
that the President would use his unlimited powers to establish prohibition zones 
about mines and munition plants and other war work, first in the Wisconsin 
case, and thereafter only by retail in localities that allow especially scandalous 
conditions, or make a majority demand for zones of prohibition, with cap¬ 
ital AND LABOR BOTH JOINING IN THIS NEW PRESIDENTIAL LOCAL OPTION. 

Senator Henry L. Myers, after waiting till September 18, 1918, for Presi¬ 
dent to use his new powers to close saloons about coal mines to remove what he 
called on August ii our greatest “danger,” namely, fuel scarcity, introduced a 
bill to establish the five mile dry zones by act of Congress. Bill was referred 
to Senate Judiciary Committee before whom Senator Myers expects to appear 
with others to urge immediate passage of this bill to avert a fuel peril, which 
Congress must either prevent quickly or risk the hot wrath that will make even 
heatless days warm for all who might have prevented them. 

Petitions, letters, telegrams and deputations should be sent to Fuel 
Administration, and to every Senator and Congressman in behalf of full 
war prohibition, but especially of this emergency bill to avert fuel crisis. 

The Myers bill will, of course only aim to stop sale to people in five-mile 
radius about coal mines. Breweries and wholesalers will be allowed to ship to 
people residing outside the five-mile zone on written orders to be kept for in¬ 
spection by federal officials. This bill is needed for immediate relief which no 
other Government action will reach or can reach except an order of the President; 
and this is a legislative act that ought to be done by men of both parties through 
act of Congress. 

More Mine Operators Testify. 

And now for the special benefit of any honest doubters who want more testi¬ 
mony on the effect of saloons upon mines, some of the strong evidence coal 
producers sent to the Senate hearing to show that drink decreases industrial 
efficiency of miners from 10 to 30 per cent, is subjoined. 

J. W. Dawson, Charleston, West Va.: 

“After spending 20 years in every department of railroad service, including con- 


*8 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


struction, maintenance, and operation, and 20 years handling the various departments 
of the coal industry, during which time I had personal charge of constructing and 
operating three of the largest plants in Virginia and West Virginia, and having just 
visited the various mining districts of eight different States in the Union, some wet 
and some dry, and having had personal charge of one of the largest plants^ in West 
Virginia, under wet conditions and under dry, I am fully convinced that any industnai 
plant can have more, better, and more regular work performed by all classes of labor 
m a dry State than in a wet one. 

J. M. Clark, of Clark and Krebs, Charleston, West Va.: ... 

“We have been engaged in mining engineering in the State of West Virginia and 
adjoining States of Pennsylvania, Ohio, Kentucky, and Virginia for the past 30 years, 
and have observed the mining conditions under practically all degrees of temperance 
and intemperance. In the early days of the Pocahontas coal field pay day marked the 
beginning of one long revel of debauchery, and ofttimes of rnurder. During subsequeut 
years we have observed conditions under local option and in more recent years under 
State-wide prohibition in West Virginia. We have no hesitation whatever in stating 
that the present conditions under State-wide prohibition constiute by far the most 
prosperous era in the coal-mining industry within our 30 years’ knowledge, both for the 
operators and the employees. 

“ The living conditions for the miner are vastly improved, especially in reference 
to his home life and the comfort and education of his children. The homes look 
cheerful and are well kept; the children are well clothed and happy. As regards the 
efficiency of the miner, we would estimate that the average miner has an efficiency of 
from 10 to 20 per cent greater than during the previous period, when saloons were in 
close proximity. 

We have discussed the situation with numerous coal operators, and practically the 
only objection that we have heard in regard to prohibition situation is that it does not 
cover enough territory. The operators are almost a unit in stating that if we had no 
adjoining States where intoxicants could be obtained, conditions would seem to be 
ideal. We sincerely hope that your effort may have a strong influence in hastening the 
day when prohibition will be enforced from ocean to ocean and from the Great 
Lakes to the Gulf.” 

Letters of like tenor were sent to the hearing from following mines in 
Illinois (pp. 316, 317, 318) : Moneaqua Coal M. & M. Co., Oglesbay Coal Co., 
Penwell Coal Mining Co., Assumption Coal and Mining Co., Minonk Coal Co. 

The thinking people of the nation have had their patience sorely tried by a 
long series of patriotic appeals to save food and fuel; to cultivate war gardens 
and give up everything that is not strictly necessary, when the President or Con¬ 
gress might have accomplished as much as has been done by all these appeals by 
the courageous suppression for the war of a pro-German trade, which deserves 
to die, if for nothing else, for its disloyalty, clearly shown in the Senate’s investi¬ 
gation of the German-American Alliance. In the fuel situation we have surely 
reached '' the last straw,” and it is likely to catch fire. - 

A widow, whose only son had enlisted, writes that she gave her boy willingly 
and then adds: “ If he comes back wounded, I will nurse him; if he comes back 
maimed and niutilated I will care for him to the end. But if he comes back 
degraded by drink, I will never forgive: I will never forgive.” Patriotic Ameri¬ 
cans will forgive unpreparedness for war, and delays, and waste of public funds 
in making munitions, but they should not, and perhaps will not, forgive, if, 
through political cowardice, in these days of heroism and sacrifice, the President 
and Congress fail to conserve the fuel wasted in saloons, which must he saved 
or school and churches and munition plants will again be closed this winter; and 
ships will wait again in our harbors; and citizens will die of cold. 

War Prohibition Constitutional. 

When we are facing the fuel famine is a good time to face also the chronic 
objection to any restraint on the liquor traffic—“ It is unconstitutional.” The 
necessity to get the coal to save individual lives and the life of the nation should 


WHY WAR PROHIBITION? 


29 


make short work of that objection. God put great stores of coal in the earth 
for us, and we need it to make munitions and carry them, and men to use them, 
and food for the men; and we need it to “ keep the home fires burning; ” but 
the saloons, indifferent to the peril of homes, the peril of the nation, and the 
peril of the world, will not close their doors even when the National Coal Asso¬ 
ciation says we shall otherwise have an unspeakable fuel famine. Surely the 
nation has power to act in such an emergency even in peace, as President Roose¬ 
velt did when a threatened coal strike made a like emergency. If the arbitrators 
had not agreed, it is inconceivable he would have stood by inactive and let the 
nation freeze. This time we can plead not only “ the right to life,” but the 
war power, that will justify the President or Congress in doing whatever seems 
necessary to avert a situation that might paralyze our war movements. 

Mr. Wayne B. Wheeler, LL. D. (pp. 101-115) quotes many decisions of 
Supreme Court bearing on the constitutionality of prohibition during war, which 
he believes apply equally to war's concluding and most critical chapter, demobili¬ 
zation. The general tenor of these decisions is concisely expressed in the follow¬ 
ing words of Senator P. H. Knox (p. 106) in Senate debate May 14, 1917 
(Record, p. 2359), in discussing war bills in general: 

“ The war powers of the Constitution, in my opinion, are dormant, until the statui 
of war is declared by Congress, and then they may be exercised without limitation or 
qualification, to the extent that the safety of the Nation demands. Of this Congress is 
the judge, except as the Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy in the actual 
conduct of the war and in the case of great emergency or dire necessity may be 
compelled to act.” 

An opinion to the same purport by Senator A. K. Shields is found in 
Congressional Record of May 12, 1917, pp. 2271-2, and on p. 2279 may be 
found Senator Walsh's quotations from Willoughby on the Constitution. 

IV. WAR PROHIBITION IS NEEDED TO CONSERVE TRANSPOR¬ 
TATION. 

It is one of many inconsistencies of Government that is sorely trying the 
patience of patriots that the freighting of useful goods is greatly restricted while 
brewers have had unrestricted use of 700,000 cars (p. 177) to carry beer. This is 
on assumption that all beer made has been transported. If by boat or horse it has 
equally drawn on transportation facilities. These figures do not include equal use 
of car and boat space for returning empty barrels nor transportation space used 
for other liquors, nor transportation space used at sea for importing and 
exoortine liquors and materials for making them. MANIFESTLY 
THE TOTAL DRAFT ON OUR INADEQUATE TRANSPORTA¬ 
TION FACILITIES HAS BEEN NOT LESS THAN A MILLION CARS 
A YEAR WHEN WE HAVE NOT HAD TRAINS AND BOATS ENOUGH 
TO CARRY SOLDIERS AND FOOD AND FUEL FOR OUR WAR 

factories and our waiting ships. 

Expert Testimony on Drink's Blight of Industry. 

Mr. Deets Pickett submitted at the Senate hearing, without reading, testi- 
money not second in importance to any, as to the delay of munition work by drink, 
first by its slowing effect on miners of coal; second, by its diversion of cars 
to serve drink-makers and drink-sellers; third, by its slowing up of munition 
workers (p. 176-7). The testimony is in part as follows: 

The Northern Iron Co. produces more than 50 per cent of the low phosphorus pig 
iron in the United States. It is an absolute, primary essential in the manufacture of 
guns projectiles, and many other appliances used in the conduct of the war. In a letter 
to Mr Walter F Ballinger, of the firm of Ballinger & Perrot, Philadelphia, this com¬ 
pany makes public the fact that for weeks in the middle of the winter (1917-18) it had 


30 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


one of its furnaces shut down on account of the shortage of fuel, while the brewing 
industry was using hundreds of thousands of tons of coal. After an investigation the 
company found that it was losing about 16 per cent of the working time of its men 
because of alcoholic beverages, and that its accidents were increased 43 per cent by the 
same agency. ^ 

Mr. W. S. Pilling, the president of the company, transmitted to Mr. Ballinger a 
letter signed by the general manager, Mr. L. P. Ross, which says: 

“ Wc know nothing that would be as beneficial in the prosecution of the war, and 
nothing that would add to our staying power as would prohibition.” Although both 
the fuel and railway departments exerted themselves to the utmost to give he Northern 
Iron Co. relief, they were unable to do so for quite a protracted period, and on Feb¬ 
ruary 6 Mr. Ross stated that the Northern Iron Co. was producing only one-quarter of 
the tonnage it could have produced if fully supplied with fuel. Many other industries 
were in a similar condition, declares Mr. Ross, and he continues under date of Feb¬ 
ruary 6: 

“We are convinced that one of the very large contributing causes to the present 
deplorable and disquieting condition which our country is in is the liquor traffic. 
For instance, there are hundreds of thousands of tons of fuel now being consumed by 
the brewers and in the places where alcoholic beverages are dispensed. There is also 
an enormous number of railroad cars required for the transportation of raw materials 
and finished product of the breweries throughout the country, when the cars are sorely 
needed for fuel and war essentials. We are also told of the reduced efficiency of coal 
miners and workmen in war industries through the consumption of alcoholic beverages, 
and, from our own experience in the employment of labor, we know this to be a fact.” 


How Drink Crippled an Essential Industry. 

“Without the handicaps incident to the liquor traffic to the coal operators, the 
present available supply of fuel, and the railroad traffic, it is conceivable that we might 
be operating our plants to their maximum capacity at this time, when our product 
is so badly needed in the carrying out of the war program. Without the liquor traffic, 
we believe that thousands of other war industries, and, in fact, the Nation in general, 
would be in a correspondingly better condition. 

“ It does not seem to us as if the American people can afford to allow this menace 
to industry and economic waste to continue at a time when all of our resources and 
energy are so badly needed in the conduct of the war.” 

“ There is no question but that there is a serious shortage of labor on railroads, 
for mining and manufacturing industries, and for our farming industry. In our opin¬ 
ion, the shortage is going to increase as increasing numbers of our men are required for 
military service. Women and girls are now being employed in manufacturing in¬ 
dustries at certain classes of work, on railorads, street car lines, and in many other 
places where men were formerly employed. This is not, in our opinion, altogether 
desirable for many reasons. Furthermore, we do not believe there is enough work 
that is suitable for women to relieve the labor situation. It seems to us, therefore, 
that in view of the increasing demands on our industries and farms for increased pro¬ 
duction, especially those materials and food essentials in ^ihe conduct of the war, that 
we should strive in every conceivable way to increase the efficiency of our available 
supply of labor. Basing our opinion on the above data and also on our observation of 
many industries with which we are familiar, we firmly believe that the efficiency of the 
labor in the United States would be increased fully 15 per cent by the establishment 
of nation-wide prohibition. 

“The United States has productive capacity of upward of 40 , 000,000 tons of pie 
iron per annum. At the time we entered the war we were producing pig iron at the 
rate of approxicately 38 , 000,000 tons per annum. Since that time, however the pro¬ 
duction has gradually fallen, until for the months of January and February of this year 
the production had fallen to a rate of 28 , 000,000 tons, or a falling off in production of 
approximately 10,000,000 tons. According to our observation, this falling off has been 
due to a shortage of fuel and congested railroad traffic. 

“ We estimate that the breweries and saloons consume coal at the rate of aporoxi 
mately 273,328 three-ton carloads per annum. This amount of fuel would produrV an 
proximately 8 , 197,140 tons of pig iron. c p- 

“We have been reliably informed that approximately 350,000 men are en^ao-ed in 
the liquor traffic. m 

“It is evident to us that if the fuel consumed by the liquor traffic could be turned 
to the production of war essentials, such as iron and steel, and the labor employed in 


WHY WAR PROHIBITION? 


31 


the liquor traffic diverted to the mines and industries, there would be ample labor and 
fuel to develop our maximum capacity. Furthermore, the relief to the railroads of 
the transportation of materials entering into the manufacture of beer and the beer 
itself would go a long way toward relieving the railroad congestion and increasing our 
railroad efficiency. 

“ In view of all of the above, it seems to us that, as a business proposition, if for 
no other reason, the country should be put on a dry basis. We know of no one thing 
which would so increase our resources and add to our staying power in the conduct 
of the present war as would nation-wide prohibition.” 

V. WAR PROHIBITION IS NEEDED TO SPEED UP OUR URGENT 
SHIP BUILDING PROGRAM. 


Reply to Messrs Hurley and Colby. 

The expressed apprehensions of Hon. Edward N. Hurley and Hon. Bain- 
bridge Colby, of the U. S. Shipping Board, that taking away beer from ship 
workers by war prohibition would reduce their efficiency twenty-five per cent 
by its effect, not on their bodies but on their minds, that is, by the displeasure 
it would cause, and presumably also by driving many of them to other jobs 
(pp. 146, 207, 229)—for which fears not a word of proof was brought or 
even sought from the many shipbuilding plants in “ dry ” States, were at once 
refuted overwhelmingly by telegrams of many expert witnesses, real shipbuilders, 
who had built ships in dry” States or dry” zones, none of whom had 
found that prohibition disgruntled workmen or drove them away, or in any way 
hindered the work. Their positive testimony is that prohibition increases effi¬ 
ciency. That has been fully demonstrated both in laboratories and in workshops. 

We are very much indebted to “ our friend the enemy for firing at us the 
clumsy guess that taking away beer would reduce efficiency 25 per cent, for it 
has drawn this broadside of refutations from experienced shipbuilders, who do 
not guess but knozv the effect on labor of building ships in a “ dry ” environment. 
Never in any court was any slander ever refuted more swiftly and decisively by 
unimpeachable witnesses. Among them are the active managers of many great 
shipbuilding companies, of whom the following are representative: 

Newport News Shipbuilding Co. (Va., p. 184). 

York Shipbuilding Co. (Va., p. 188). 

Newcomb Shipbuilding and Dry Dock Co. (Va., p. 188). 

Merrill Stevens Shipbuilding Co. (Va., p. 188). 

Brunswick Marine Shipbuilding Co. (Va., p. 189). 

United States Maritime Co. (Va., p. 189). 

American Shipbuilding Co. (Va., p. 189). 

Potomac Shipyard (Va., p. 314)- 

Bell-Wallace Boat Yard (N. C., p. 314). 

Foundation Ship Co. (Ga., p. 3 ^ 4 ) 

Terry Ship Yard (Ga., p. 314). 

Mosspoint Ship Yard (Miss., p. 314)- 

Southern Dry Dock and Shipbuilding Co. (Texas, p. 317). 

McBride and Lew Ship Company (Texas, p. 317). 

Beaumont Shipbuilding and Dry Dock Co. (Texas, p. 317). 

Detroit Shipbuilding Co. (p. 317). 

Great Lakes Engineering Co (Detroit, pp. 210, 317)._ 


Of course alcohol in any quantity reduces efficiency of body and mind. On p. 314 testimony m 
a lumber company. For two thousand years, since Greece held her Olympic games, it has 
Sfivertally recognized that athletes must abstain Curiously enough, many who believed alcohol 
M wJJvln athletes did not doubt it would strengthen workmen and soldiers, just as the Adminis- 
s^Sesmen, in the^ s^^ of 1918. as North American suggests, appeared to be • m the 

SfsitlSn of favoring prohibition to increase the efficiency of the coal mine workers, and in favor of 
uitoxicanto to increase the efficiency of the shipyards. 





32 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


Messrs. Robert Dollar, George F. Cotterill, W. H. Paul Hamus testify for 
Pacific Coast yards (pp. 261-263, 318). 

In the launchings of July 4 , 1918 , in the United States, 63 wooden ships and 42 
steel ships, the tonnage of the Pacific Coast, mostly built in “ dry ” territory, excelled 
all other sections. Pacific Coast, 252 , 000 ; Atantic Coast, 127 , 964 ; Gulf, 57 , 500 ; Great 
Lakes, 37 , 000 . 

The following telegram of Mr. J. R. Russell, President of Great Lakes 
Engineering Works (p. 207) is representative of the testimony from all the 
above-named builders, who have tried and proved building without booze. 

“We have shipbuilding plants in Detroit, La Crosse, and Ashtabula, and know 
positively that the morale and efficiency of our men has been improved by the change 
from so-called wet to dry conditions. At conference today of our executive officers, 
general managers, and superintendents of various pl^ts, serious objections were raised 
by all present to modification in any way of j)rohibitory laws now in effect in this 
State. If any statutory permission is given for the sale of beer and light wines in 
the neighborhood of our yards, it will positively impair program for delivery of ships 
we have promised to Shipping Board. We are confident large majority of our em¬ 
ployes would concur in the expression of opinion. Prohibition has had such a signal 
success in improving ship output in Michigan that similar legislation absolutely re¬ 
quired, in our opinion, to enable Shipping Board ot carry out its war program for 
production.” 

Tommy Mason’s Boozeless Builders. 

When Edward N. Hurley, chairman of the United States Shipping Board, 
expressed fears to Congress in 1918 that a nation-wide ban on booze would 
retard shipbuilding, hundreds of brawny patriots who are pounding out ships 
in Camden in record time replied: 

“ Tell it to Tommy Mason! ” 

Tommy Mason was superintendent of the construction work on the Tucka- 
hoe, the naval collier turned out of the yards of the New York Shipbuilding 
Company in twenty-seven days, breaking a world’s record. After the launching 
of the Tuckahoe, Charles M. Schwab, director of the shipping board, sought 
Mason to learn how he and his men had made such phenomenal speed. 

** I want to pass your secret along to the other shipyards,” said Schwab. 

** No booze,” replied JY[ as on. That’s the secret 

Schwab did not testii> before the Senate Committee as expected.* 

He might have told that Mason’s group of workers, each of whom received 
a reward from Schwab, not only broke a world’s record in turning out the 
Tuckahoe, but how it has attained a reputation in the Camden shipyards as the 
gang that can do the fastest work, has fewer absences from all causes, and 50 
per cent, fewer accidents than any other group of workmen of the same size 
in the plant. 

He might have told how Mason, when the order of the day in the nation’s 
shipyards was “speed up,” watched to see that no boozers got places on his gang. 
Mason has spent almost a lifetime in the shipyards and experience told him that 
booze and efficient work don’t mix. 

There were just two exceptions to Tommy Mason’s ban on boozers. They 
were two riveters, whom he permitted to remain in his gang for awhile, although 
he knew that they “ took a drink or two ” in the morning before they came to 
work. But Mason also discovered that it was several hours each day before 
these two men reached their maximum speed, and occasionally they failed to 
report for duty. The superintendent took a pencil and paper and did some 
calculating. He found out what the delay of these two men was costing the 

* Later, Sept. 2, Schwab said to a speed-up meeting of sixteen hundred foremen, “Don’t build shins 
with beer—build them with elbow grease.’’ ^ 




WHY WAR PROHIBITION? 


33 


t/ork of the gang. He deducted the number or rivets which “ a drink or two 
in the morning was costing. 

He found that sober riveters had a larger average of rivets to their credit, 
at the end of the week, and the two boozers left. The Tuckahoe’s record satis¬ 
fied him that he is on the right course. 

The supreme witness on shipbuilding in war time, the Secretary of the 
Navy, Hon. Josephus Daniels, in an unanswerable statement in favor of a “ dry 
environment for shipbuilders, gives the following facts and opinions (pp. 233- 

239) : 

"" In every case where we have had a shipyard or a community to go from 
open saloons to prohibition, there has been an increased efficiency and marked 
improvement. 

“ Perhaps I might illustrate that by the case of Newport, R. L, and Mare 
Island, Cal. At Mare Island we have one of the largest shipyards, where we 
are now building the California, a great dreadnaught, and destroyers and other 
craft. In Newport, R. L, we have a large plant, where we make torpedoes. 
They are both very important places and very efficient. Some time ago the 
Commandant of the Mare Island Navy Yard, Capt. Harry George, a very capa¬ 
ble officer, recommended that Mare Island be placed in the 5-mile zone district. 
His primary purpose was to protect the enlisted men who were under training 
but also to make a better condition for the men who were working in the ship¬ 
yard. When his recommendation reached Washington and it became known, 
there were not a few protests from Mare Island against such an order; and there 
were not a few people who said that if this order was put into effect the men 
who were employed in the shipbuilding at Mare Island would resent it, and the 
product would be decreased. I looked into the matter very thoroughly and took 
some weeks to do so. After an investigation made by naval officers and others 
the order was issued. Today the very men, or many of them, who protested 
against this order, approve it. The efficiency of that yard has steadily improved^ 
It was excellent then, and the great mass of men who work in that yard were 
sober and temperate men. But the temptation of salo^ ns at the door of the 
yard did cause some of the young men to drink, whose efficiency was thereby 
impaired. We have increased our men at Mare Island in the last four months 
by 400. The other day we launched a destroyer from the Mare Island Navy 
Yard which broke the world's record in time of construction, much of the work 
on which had been done since Mare Island became a dry district. 

“ At Newport, R. I., last year we had 20,000 men under training. We had 
about 3,000 men making torpedoes. The condiitons there were so deplorable 
because of the saloons that I had not one but scores and hundreds of letters 
form fathers and mothers of boys who were being trained in Newport protest¬ 
ing that something ought to be done. I referred the matter to Captain Bryan, 
vrho was the commandant of that district, and after trying by every possible method 
to get the people in the city and the proprietors of saloons to co-operate in secur¬ 
ing a better condition, and failing, Captain Bryan recommended earnestly the 
five-mile zone. Captain Beach, who is the commandant of the torpedo works 
and to whom is given the duty of making torpedoes, the most essential instru¬ 
ments in this war, wrote not only once but several times, and earnestly appealed 
to have a five-mile zone in that district, because he feared that if one or two 
or three men at the factory should become intoxicated something might happen 
to the works; and he regarded it as the best influence for the carrying on of 
this important industry that a dry zone should be created around Newport. 


34 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


That was done, and some of the people who opposed it, and some people who 
doubted the wisdom of it, believe that it was a wise act. There iS;NOT a skilled 

WORKMAN OR UNSKILLED WORKMAN IN NEWPORT, WHETHER HE BELIEVED IN IT 
OR NOT, WHO HAS NOT SAID, BY HIS ACTS, “ I AM JUST AS WILLING TO MAKE A 
SACRIFICE, IF NEED BE, FOR THE WAR AS I EXPECT MY BROTHER IN UNIFORM TO 
MAKE.” I BELIEVE THAT THE FOREIGN-BORN POPULATION WHO ARE IN THE 
NAVY YARDS-AND THEY ARE VERY HIGH-CLASS MEN-EVEN THOUGH THEY PER¬ 

SONALLY WOULD BE OPPOSED TO THIS MOVEMENT, WOULD SAY TO THEMSELVES, ^ IF 
MY BROTHER WHO IS IN THE ARMY AND MY BROTHER WHO IS IN THE NAVY CAN 
HAVE IMPOSED UPON THEM DURING THIS WAR THE CONDITION THAT HE CAN NOT 
FOLLOW HIS HABITS OR HIS TASTES, I AM WILLING TO DO THE SAME THING.” I 
HAVE FOUND IN THIS WAR THAT THERE IS NO DIFFERENCE BETWEEN MEN IN 
UNIFORM AND MEN OUT OF UNIFORM IN SUPPORTING THE WAR, AND THAT IT IS A 
MISUNDERSTANDING OF THE SPIRIT OF THE MEN IN THE NAVY YARDS OR OTHER 
SHIPBUILDING YARDS OR IN MUNITIONS PLANTS TO THINK THAT THEY WOULD 
STOP WORK OR LESSEN THEIR WORK BY REASON OF SUCH LEGISLATION. 

“ I know them very well; I am in very close touch with them. I visit 
nearly every navy yard in this coast every year. I know the spirit of the men; 
I know their feeling. You can go into any navy yard on the Atlantic coast, and 
you will find men who would like to have prohibition and men who are opposed 
to it. You will find varying views, like lawyers, or doctors, or business men. 
But the opinion that production would he decreased hy prohibition is contrary 
to all experience. Experience shows efficiency is increased. One ounce of ex¬ 
perience is worth a pound of opinion. 

“I have not spoken of the Naval Gun Factory at Washington. We have 
here in Washington a Naval Gun Factory that will soon be one of the biggest 
gun factories in the world. We have increased the number of men during the 
last six months over 2,000. The efficiency of that yard has steadily improved. 
Congress made it dry. We have not heard a critici.sm or a v/ord from any man, 
in that yard against that action. And nobody has quit work and nobody has 
lessened his efficiency. Most of them were efficient before. Understand me, I 
do not advocate any policy on the ground that if a man takes a drink he is going 
to be inefficient. But I NEVER KNEW A MAN WHO DRANK A LONG 
WHILE WHO COULD DO ANYTHING .AS WELL AS HE COULD 
HAVE DONE HIS WORK IF HE DID NOT DRINK. TOTAL ABSTI¬ 
NENCE PROMOTES EFFICIENCY EVERYWHERE.” 

As to the effect of prohibition on great industries in general the newest 
testimony comes from Detroit (pp. 275-293), the largest city under prohibition, 
whose foremost manufacturers and business men, headed by Mr. Henry M. 
Leland, of “ Lincoln Motor Company,” sent a statement to Congress, dated 
June 22, 1918, rebutting the opinions of Messrs. Hurley and Colby. From that 
statement the following representative paragraphs are taken, in proof that even 
in fifty-two days the new prohibition law of Michigan had increased the efficiency 
of labor. 

“There is no division of opinion among our leaders. They are unanimous in 
in giving emphatic testimony to the wonderful benefits prohibition is producing. Our 
big concerns are reporting fewer absentees of men, fewer accidents, greater unity, and 
higher efficiency on the part of their employees. Their men come to work now with 
clear heads and steady hands on Monday mornings and after holidays. Detroit’s ex¬ 
perience has proved beyond a possibility of doubt that the wage earners do not insist 
on their beer as the price for their loyalty; and that, instead of prohibition causing 
any industrial revolution or disorganization, it, on the other hand, is a most valuable 


WHY WAR PROHIBITION? 


contribution to industrial efficiency, higher productivity, and conservation of man 
power—all of which are of very vital consideration to our country in these war times.” 

The American Car and Foundry Co., of Detroit, through F. M. Stevenson, 
gives this testimony on same date as above: 

“ We find that since May i our general working conditions have improved 
very much, production has increased, and we believe the well-being of our work¬ 
men and their families has been considerably benefited by the elimination of booze. 
We notice that our men are now in good condition on Monday mornings to begin 
their weeks’ labor, whereas formerly we had a, large percentage fo workmen carry¬ 
ing “ hangovers ” from their week end dissipations, and many of these men were 
entirely unfit to take up their duties on Monday mornings. Our records also 
show that less serious accidents have occurred, and this is quite remarkable inas¬ 
much as our force has been rapidly increasing during the past six weeks, now 
totaling approximately 8,000 men on day and night shifts.” 

Mr. R. E. Olds, President of Reo Motor Co., two days later, wrote: 

Prohibition has added to the number of working days of employees, 

INCREASED THEIR EFFICIENCY, AND HAS RESULTED IN GREATLY INCREASED PRODUC¬ 
TION AND FEWER ACCIDENTS. WiTH SALOONS LARGE NUMBERS OF TOOLS STOOD 
IDLE AFTER PAY DAYS ; ASSEMBLERS COULD NOT PROCEED ON ACCOUNT OF SHORTAGE 
OF FINISHED PARTS CAUSED BY THE ABSENCE OF EMPLOYEES. As SOON AS EM¬ 
PLOYEES HAD AN OPPORTUNITY TO MAKE A COMPARISON OF CONDITIONS A GREAT 
MAJORITY OF THEM JOINED WITH THEIR EMPLOYERS IN FAVORING ELIMINATION 
OF SALOONS.” 

Mr. S. S. Kresge, the well-known merchant, also of Detroit, repeated at 
the hearing information received directly from Henry Ford's factory, which has 
forty thousand employees, that on the first Monday in April, 1918—that was the 
last wet month—2,620 persons failed to report for duty; on the first Monday 
of May, 1,628—1,002 less. On the second “ dry ” Monday the record was about 
one hundred better than on the first. 

In explanation of the fact that a conisderable number were off duty the 
first two diy ” Mondays, it should be remembered that some drinkers lay in a 
supply before prohibition goes into effect. Also that the “ wet ” State of Ohio 
is only a few hours ride away from Detroit and is doubtless visited on Sunday 
by some of these highly-paid workmen. 

We shall not get a full exhibit of the great benefits of prohibition until some 
time after all States have gone “ dry,” when stocks laid in by drinkers for the 
prohibition era are generally exhausted, which will be about the time the new 
century reaches its majority, in 1921. The cities of Indiana that border on 
Ohio, Illinois and Kentucky have no fair chance to get the benefit of Indiana’s 
prohibition law. Twenty-one automobiles have been wrecked in the vicinity of 
Winchester, Ind., since the Indiana prohibition law went into effect all of which 
accidents the authorities say have been due to the excessive use of intoxicants. 
Randolph county, of which Winchester is the county seat, adjoins Ohio, which is 
not di*y territory, and the motor parties have been going into that state to get 
liquor. All such cases are piling up arguments for national prohibition, as a 
war measure for the immediate emergency, and constitutional national prohibi¬ 
tion to seal the banishment of these efficiency-killing, law-defying saloons from 
the whole land—erelong it shall be from the world when we have proved its full 
value in a nationwide test. 


36 


BRIEFS FOR IVROHIBITION. 


Why Fears of Labor Unrest From War Prohibition Are Unwarranted. 

Replying to intimations by Messrs. Hurley and Colby that labor might be 
dissatisfied and leave work if beer was prohibited, Mr. E. C. Dinwiddie said to 
the Committee: (i) that such fears have not been realized in the big industrial 
cities that have gone under prohibition in time of peace—Atlanta, Denver, Se¬ 
attle, Detroit: (2) that such fears of labor unrest are less likely to be realized 
in war time when people are used to sacrifices for winning the war; (3) that 
under national prohibition workmen can not run from a “ dry ” to a “ wet ” 
State. They will be like the fellow who was ‘ all dressed up and no place to go.' 

Mr. Dinwiddie also submitted a representative letter from Burton Crank- 
shaw of Nashua (N. H.) Manufacturing Company, showing groundlessness of 
the common charge that prohibition would drive workmen from town or State 
(P- 257); 

“ In reply to your letter of May 31 making inquiries as to the working of the pro¬ 
hibitory law, 1 would say that in the Nashua Mills we have found no loss of help. 
Much was said before the 1st of Alay that there would be a large number of working 
people moving to Massachusetts, especially Poles and Lithuanians. Then, after the 
1 st of May many rumors were circulated of the number that left our city. I took the 
pains to examine our records and found that the average number of male Polanders 
and Lithuanians who left us each week in April were 2.7 per cent of those whom we 
employed. For three weeks following the 1st of May of the prohibition that had 
decreased to 2 ..5 per cent. I found that we actually made a gain of five male Poles for 
the month of May.” 

Additional letters from Manchester, the other large city of the State, tells 
the same story. 

Mr. Charles L. Pluston, Vice President of Lukens Iron & Steel Co., Coates- 
ville. Pa., gave following testimony on the same point from Coatesville, “ dry " by 
local option (p. 265) : 

“ Dire prophecies had been put forth when this action was taken of what was going 
to come of it, prophecies that the industries could not continue to work, industries 
which were employing a great many men, and particularly a large percentage of for¬ 
eign-speaking men. Those men, having been accustomed to the regular use of drinks, 
it was claimed they would not stay, that they would leave the town. However, after 
the matter had been running for some time they found out that that was entirely 
erroneous, and upon careful inquiry we could learn of but two or three men who had 
left and stated that they were leaving because they could not get drinks in the town. 
On the contrary, men came to us seeking employment and said that they were glad to 
get employment in a town where liquor was not licensed to be sold. Accidents were 
greatly reduced, accidents resulting from carelessness, and absences on Monday morn¬ 
ings and the days following pay day were very greatly reduced, the men coming out 
to work instead of being mysteriously absent. 

“ A Polish man who had been told that he would have to get along without his 
liquor said, ‘ No beer, no whiskey, me no work.' He was told that he would have to 
manage to get along without it in some way, and a little later he said to the same 
man, ‘ No beer, no whiskey, me buy a house.’ And he has continued with us and is 
a very good man, a faithful workman, up to the present time. 

“ I inquired from one of our men if he had heard any men express themselves, men 
not considered intemperate but accustomed to take a drink on the way to work. He 
said, ‘yes,’ that just the day before he had heard one such man say that he had been 
in the habit regularly of taking a couple of drinks at the saloon on his way to work 
and a couple of drinks on his way home. He thought he needed it. He thought he 
needed it to keep up his efficiency in his v/ork, but he said that now that the saloons 
were closed, ‘ I can’t get it here and I won’t go out of my way to seek it, so I am 
going without it, and I am a 100 per cent better man.’ ” 

Prohibition drove some people from Colorado to Wyoming, but they 'were 
of such a quality as gave Wyoming strong impetus to prohibition to prevent it 
from becoming the sink of the prohibition commonwealths on all sides. When 


WHY WAR PROHIBITION? 


37 


national prohibition comes, it is to be hoped such people will leave the country. 
We can well afford to give them free passage back to their homelands for good 
riddance. 

Reply to Gompers. 

The apprehension of labor trouble if beer should be taken from workmen, 
expressed by Messrs. Hurley and Colby, and generally understood to be the feel¬ 
ing of the President, seems to have been inspired by frequent previous intima¬ 
tions to the same effect from Mr. Samuel Gompers, President of the American 
Federation of Labor, whose letters and speeches against prohibition always carry 
as their undertone the sentiment he learned in Britain— 

“ Blast his eyes, whoever he tries 
To rob the poor man of his beer.” 

When Messrs. Hurley and Colby expressed the opinion that taking away 
beer would lessen efficiency of shipbuilders 25 per cent, it was so contrary to 


Citizens should study all the columns in following table showing not only coal 
used but capital and employment relations in various lines of business. This does not 
include coal used in saloons but only in breweries. Figures from U. S. Census, 1910, 

Establishments.Employees. Capital. Coal Used. 

Boots and Shoes. 1,918 198,297 $222,324,000 332,758 

Bread and Bakery products.23,926 144,322 212,910,000 829,526 

Clothing (men’s) . 6,354 271,437 275,320,000 146,126 

Printing and Publishing.31,445 258,434 588,346,000 506.525 

Liquors, Malt . 1,414 54,579 671,158,000 2,990,357 

The 25 per cent loss Messrs. Hurley and Colby guessed would come to labor 
efficiency had neither facts nor experience to back it; but it is interesting to find that 
same per cent loss named by an expert in coal mining as the actual loss, not from 
taking beer away but from keeping it. Here is the item from Patriot Phalanx of July 
5 , 1918: “On a recent Tuesday the president of the Citizens’ Title and Trust Company, 
of Uniontown, Pa., was at Dunbar talking with the superintendent of the Dunbar Fur¬ 
nace Company’s coal mine. The superintendent was asked, ‘ How are you getting along 
today? ’ The reply was, ‘ Seventy-five of our men were at Clark’s saloon over yonder 
yesterday and we couldn’t run; and fifty of them are there today, so that we are run¬ 
ning light.” His testimony was that the detriment to coal production produced by the 
saloon was at least 25 per cent. The conditions in the coal regions are aggravated by 
the high wages that miners are now receiving, which make it possible for them to 
work three or four days and then booze the rest of the week. The coal operators of 
the Pittsburgh district who stated that prohibition would increase the output of coal 
5 , 000,000 tons in the Pittsburgh disrict alone, probably fell short of what would prove 
to be the actual fact.” 

If the contentions of Messrs. Gompers, Hurley and Colby are correct they should 
straightway placard our streets with the slogan, “ Booze will win the war.” 

The U. S. Statistical Abstract shows the number employed for each million dollars 
invested in six representative industries, and the ratio of wages paid to capital in¬ 
vested, which is as follows: Lumber, 597 employed, 27.1 per cent; textiles, 574—23.9 
per cent; leather, 469—23.5 per cent; paper and printing, 369—21.3 per cent; iron, 
2S4—17.6 per cent; liquors, 77—5.6 per cent. 

Mr. John Spargo, long a socialist, now active in new National Party, speaking in 
Oct., 1917, to City Club, of Cleveland, said: “The need for alcohol for industrial and 
military purposes has become so great that we could use all that the distilleries and 
breweries of the nation can produce, and more. For the first time in the history of 
modem civilizaion, that is to say, for the first time since the onganized liquor traffic 
came into existence as a menace to civilization, it has become possible for us to remove 
it from our midst without any economic dislocation whatever; without displacing labor 
or closing a single brewery or distillery. Each of us, in so far as we believe in the 
great visfon of industrial democracy, are under deep moral compulsion to urge Con¬ 
gress to prohibit the manufacture and sale of intoxicating beverages. There can never 
be anything like a great and worthy industrial democracy until we have abolished the 
liquor traffic. That alcoholism is the geratest single obstacle to the realization of our 
social ideal hardly permit of any question. 








38 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


experience that it brought from other employers all over the country, as we have 
shown, a storm of refutation. Why is it that labor leaders have not overwhelmed 
Mr. Gompers with protests against his insulting intimations that labor would 
not calmly give up its beer even if Congress should require it on patriotic and 
humanitarian groundsf 

All who know labor unions intimately will find the answer at once in the 
fact that organized employees do not feel as free to express individual opinions 
as do employers, and it naturally takes some courage for lieutenants of Mr. 
Gompers to oppose him or even dissent publicly from his views. Besides, work¬ 
men are not so ready with the pen as their employers. Nevertheless it can be 
shown that MR. GOMPERS IN DEVOTING A LARGE PART OF HIS 
TIME TO OPPOSING PROHIBITION, DOES NOT REPRESENT 
DIRECTLY OR INDIRECTLY THE AMERICAN FEDERATION OF 
LABOR, MUCH LESS THE TWENTY TIMES LARGER ARMY OF 
AMERICAN BREADWINNERS. 

Just as Cardinal Gibbons, though senior American Cardinal, in no sense 
speaks for the Catholic Church when he opposes prohibition—did not even cerry 
the Catholics of Maryland with him when he opposed ratification—so Mr. 
Gompers, though President of the American Federation of Labor, has no man¬ 
date from it against prohibition. More of the eminent Catholic leaders stand 
for the suppression of the saloon than for its continuance, and so there are more 
eminent labor leaders that fight the drink than defend it. (See Stelzle’s “ Whv 
Prohibition,” pp. 118 - 161 ). 

In Mr. Gompers’ letter to Representative E. Y. Webb, dated Dec. 6, 1917 , 
in opposition to constitutional prohibition, he said: “ I do not address you and 
through you the Judiciary Committee as the officer of any organization, but as a 
man and a citizen.” Tell it out to those who have thought the American Fed¬ 
eration of Labor is speaking through him when he attacks prohibition, and 
intimates that American workmen will not stand it. Furthermore, Mr. Gompers, 
at Senate Committee hearing, in explaining why the conventions of the American 
Federation of Labor had never voted on prohibition, read (p. 241) from Article 
III, Sec. 8, of the Federation’s Constitution the following inhibition: “ Party 
politics, whether they be Democratic, Republican, Socialistic, Populistic, Prohibi¬ 
tion or any other, shall have no place in the conventions of the American Federa¬ 
tion of Labor.” 

Because prohibition is a party issue to the Prohibition Party, though whony- 
non-partisan in bills and laws of Congress, he rules that nothing can be said 
or done about it in the Federation’s conventions. Sticklers for consistency might 
ask if the spirit of that article is not violated when the President of the Federa¬ 
tion habitually does the very same sort of work that paid attorneys of liquor 
associations did in Washington in former years, but seem to find it unnecessary 
to do since Mr. Gompers has become their active champion. 

We do not charge that Mr. Gompers receives money pa^^ment from the 
brewers. Any man familiar with politics in Washington does; not need to be 
reminded that men who have to get themselves reelected every year may be 
rewarded by services in that connection. It is significant that at least forty of the 
constituent bodies in the American Federation of Labor are bartenders unions 
and the like. The brewers and liquor dealers apparently see an opportunity to 
reciprocate by allowing their employees to organize and back Mr. Gompers^ for 



WHY WAR PROHIBITION? 


39 


reelection, and at the same time incline other labor unions to stand by them as 
“ brothers in trouble when prohibition is threatened.* 

To return to our subject, though Mr. Gompers professes to act unofficially 
in opposing prohibition, he has claimed twice in presenting petitions against 
prohibition to Congress, the first, a petition of labor unions in 1916, the second 
of labor leaders in 1918, that the petitions represented really, though unofficially, 
the sentiments of the two millions of labor unionists in the Federation. 

This is imporatnt if true. Is it true? 

Mr. Charles Stelzle conclusively refuted the claim of Mr. Gompers that the 
first petition represented, by vote of their labor unions, 2,082,637 union working¬ 
men. Pie showed that although the petition confessedly included no labor unions 
save those affiliated with the Federation, it claimed to represent 10,000 more 
than the membership of the Federation as given in its own official minutes. It 
turned out that thousands were counted twice, some three and even four times 
in different organizations, local, state, national and special. Only 22 out of 48 
States were represented, and only 445 local labor bodies out of 22,000. § 

The editor also examined that petition, and noted that the unions petitioning 
Congress against prohibition were only one fiftieth of those in the Federation, 
and all of them were from States then wet,” which, therefore, had no knowl¬ 
edge of the subject. If an attorney should call 445 character witnesses who were 
all obliged to confess they had no first-hand acquaintance with the accused man, 
and knew only what they had heard from others at a distance, the lawyer would 
be fined for contempt of court. And any one with any saving sense of humor 
will laugh that petiiton out of court as if it were the voice of frogs in the 
swamp croaking that they did not believe it could be healthy to live high and dry. 

Union Labor Favors Prohibition Wherever Tried Out. 

THE PETITIONS RELATING TO PROHIBITION FROM “ DRY 
STATES ARE FOR IT. The editor has for years kept tab on petitions to 
Congress for moral measures, and he has not found any petition against prohibi¬ 
tion from any State that has tried it. Here are samples of the uniformally 
favorable testimony of organized labor in “ dry ” States, selected from many 
opinions quoted in prohibition debate on Dec. 17, 1917, by Representative E. Y. 
Webb, from labor leaders of Washington, Colorado, Arizona, Idaho, Iowa and 
Oregon: 

State of Washington. 

I was opposed to the passage of the prohibition act in this State. To the great 
body of our working men, however, the law has been a distinct blessing. 

H. P. MARCH, 

President Washington State Federation of Labor. 

* It would be pertinent for those who support Mr. Gompers to work for labor to ask who pays some 
of the big bills that must have been incurred in his work for liquor, which clearly could not be legally 
drawn from the treasury of the Federation of Labor under the very article Mr. Gompers has quoted 
to show it can not take action for or against prohibition. Who paid the fare of Mr, Gompers to Albany 
to oppose ratification of national constitutional prohibition? (He was challenged by a prohibition 
leader of that State to deny he had a “ working agreement with the brewers.”) Who paid for the 
printing of his letter to the House Judiciary Committee as a full page ad in the Washington Star of 
Dec. IG, 1917? If he paid these bills personally, in what way have the beneficiaries of his anti-pro¬ 
hibition ’ efforts reciprocated? Some are saying that a man who seems to be the champion at Wash¬ 
ington both of liquor and labor will be a dangerous man in the industrial shake up that must follow 
the war The writer would feel so but that Mr. Gompers seems wholly lacking in that ” magnetic 
leadership ” that has made the followers of Blaine and Bryan and Roosevelt ready to follow them 
passionately wherever they lead. In fifty cities in the spring of 1918, the writer expr^sed to audiences 
mostly of workmen at factories and on the streets, some of the criticisms of Mr Gompers that arc 
printed here and no one ever spoke in his defense or even looked displeased. But for the compliment* 
L gets from political leaders, some of whom would curry his favor, some of whom fear, we think 
without due cause, his oft-repeated threats, his leadership of labor might soon end. 

S See p. 153 ©f Mr. Stelzle’s book, ” Why Prohibition,” which conclusively shows liquor is every¬ 
where the supreme foe of labor, and that labor’s best leaders and best unions say so. 




40 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


Colorado. 

I voted against prohibition. I am now irrevocably opposed to the saloon. You 
could not die: up a corporal’s guard of trade-unionists who would vote for a return of 
the saloon. WILLIAM C. THORNTON, 

July 22, 1917. President Denver Trades and Labor Assembly. 

When Mr. Gompers again in 1918 (p. 242 ) made the claim that a petition 
signed only by labor leaders personally, at the request of the President of the 
Brewery Workers International Union, represented anti-prohibition sentiments 
of all but “ a very small minority of the Federation, Senator Thompson pre¬ 
sented a communication from Mr. Willard Price, of San Francisco, sent to tJie 
hearing (p. 242 ) in which he said he had “ signed statements from labor union 
officials and delegates ” to the 1918 Convention of American Federation of Labor 
representing 600,000 labor unionists declaring in favor of war time prohibition” 
This statement and the foregoing facts plainly indicate that the Federation is by 
no means so generally opposed ot prohibition as Mr. Gompers has claimed. The 
unions in wetStates, who know nothing about prohibition directly, seem in¬ 
clined to take Mr. Gompers’ word that it is no good, and to sympathize with the 
forty bartenders unions that plead for their sympathy. There is nothing to show 
there is any considerable number of workingmen from the “ dry ” States that 
stand with Mr. Gompers in the fight against prohibition, to which he devotes 
so much time that might more apropriately be devoted to those things which the 
Federation has endorsed. Flas no one of his associates the courage to call him 
to order on that point? 

Mr. Gompers, promoted from cigar maker and retail tobacconist to labor 
leader, carries the trade idea into unionism. He has none of the knightly ideal¬ 
ism that Hon. T. V. Powderly put into the Knights of Labor; none of the world¬ 
embracing statesmanship of British labor, with its great program of world recon¬ 
struction, which the American Federation of Labor has refused to endorse. 

Is Mr. Gompers a True Patriot? 

He is praised for patriotism by those who have only noted his war talks. 
But an examination of his record and that of the Federation will show that 
both have sounded a note that sounds very much like a call to rebellion against 
decisions of the courts that enjoin labor trusts just as they enjoin other trusts 
in order to prevent anticipated injustice. Boston papers quote Mr. Gompers as 
saying in 1917 in his Labor Day message to Massachusetts workers: “Neither 
the judiciary nor precedents will be permitted to interfere with human liberty 
and betterment.” 

While Mr. Gompers intimates revolt at decrees of court and cries defiantly 
to Congress, “ Pass this law and you will hear from nearly every labor man in 
the country,” he also says meekly: “ When the President comes to the conclusion 
that the production of beer should be minimized, you won’t hear a word of 
opposition come from the lips of labor.” Of the three branches of Government, 
Legislative Judicial and Executive, he seems to be submissive only to the Execu¬ 
tive. 

Some leader of labor with larger vision is needed to marshall the millions 
of breadwinners that do not rally under Mr. Gompers’ too materialistic banner. 
Let leaders of wider vision inaugurate here a labor program as broad as that 
of British I.abor, which includes intellectual as well as manual workers, and fights 
opium and booze as well as capitalistic injustice. 


WHY WAR PROHIBITION? 


41 


“ Personal Liberty.” 

Returning to our shipbuilding program, how mean the old cry of “ personal 
hberty’^ would sound, that synonym of personal selfishness and personal deviltry, 
from the lips of men working on ships urgently needed to defend the world's 
liberty! Many of the ship builders have fled to us from foreign tyrannies to 
give their children the blessings of our “ larger liberty." And the very liberty 
of our own land is in peril from the Supertyrant. Mr. Gompers and Messrs. 
Hurley and Colby have misunderstood these men, for never have workmen any¬ 
where revolted when liberty to drink was taken away by City, State or Nation. 
They drink when drink is allowed, but know in their heart of hearts when they 
have been a few months in our atmosphere that the American way of abstinence 
is better than old Europe's boozing ways. 

VI. WAR PROHIBITION IS NEEDED TO CONSERVE FOOD¬ 
STUFFS. ^ Bishop James Cannon, Jr. (p. 157) puts the conservation part of the 
war prohibition plea thus: “Are we not justified in restricting the nonessentials 
of life in order to increase the essentials? On any other question but the liquor 
question there would not be any doubt. It is only when we touch this that we 
are called fanatics and cranks, and it is said that we do not think this is a matter 
of judgment but as a fad." Liquor organs say that the amount of foodstuffs 
destroyed is exaggerated. Then they proceed to admit three billions of pounds 
used for liquor in barley, corn and rice (Brewers' Year Book for 1917 , p. 174 ). 
But there are a dozen more foods that are destroyed to make drink, the others 
being rye and oats and hops and grapes and apples and peaches and pears and 
potatoes and turnips and beet root and sugar and molasses, “ and then some " for 
adulterations. 

The total of foodstuffs destroyed yearly in making intoxicating 
DRINKS WAS ESTIMATED BY PrOF. IrVING FiSHER OF YaLE UNIVERSITY, PrOF. 
T. N. Carver of Harvard and others, at the beginning of the war (quoted 
IN Senate debate May 12, 1917), as seven billions of pounds a year, which 
would provide seven-eights of a pound per day for every family in the 
United States. 

The Brewers’ Year Book does not agree with these figures, but confess they 
waste yearly enough food grains to equal the energy requirements of 1,880,000 
men. EVEN BY THEIR OWN ADMISSION, THE BREWERS WERE 
IN 1917 WASTING FOOD GRAINS SUFFICIENT FOR THE ENERGY 
REQUIREMENTS OF ALL THE AIEN IN ALL TPIE ARMIES OF THE 
UNITED STATES. 

Beer consumes twice as much food as whiskey, which shows that the 
President and Congress left the conservation basis when they cut off whiskey¬ 
making and allowed brewing to go on. There was whiskey enough on hand for 
beverage uses for two years, and a demand for use of some distilleries in making 
munition alcohol; and so, even without legislation, whiskey making would prob¬ 
ably have been curtailed. In any case not more than one-fourth of total waste of 
foodstuffs was saved by stopping whiskey-making. Add to that the saving of 
one-eighth of waste through beer, which is Dr. H. W. Wiley's estimate of real 
saving made by order reducing alcoholic content of beer, in which there was 
some juggling between “ content" “ by vreight" and “ volume,” makes waste 
of half a pound of diversified food each day for every family in the United 
States, on basis of one hundred and ten million population. That is enough 
to keep alive twenty millions of families in Belgium, Servia, Armenia and Syria 
and other countries crying for food—dying for lack of it. We have ''bumper*' 
crops but none to spare for bumpers while millions need it for food. 


42 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


Enquiry by the editor of this brief on July 20 at the Food Administration 
office brought the information that there was nothing later to report than the 
President’s and Mr. Hoover’s letters to Senator Morris Sheppard on May 28 
and June 4, 1918, respectfully, and the official comment added by Mf. Hoover. 
The President said: 

“ My own judgment is that it is wise and statesmanlike to let the situation stand 
as it is for the present, until at any rate I shall be apprised by the Food Administration 
that it is necessary in the way suggested still further to conserve the supply of food 
and feed stuffs.” 

Mr. Hoover’s response is thus expressed in comment officially added to his 
letter to Senator Sheppard: 

“ I wish to say emphatically that from a strictly food conservation point of view I 
should like to see the use of foodstuffs suppressed in all drinks, hard and soft. * * * 

If the American people want prohibition it should prohibit by legislation. ♦ * j£ 
the American people or Congress will stop the sale of distilled liquors the administra¬ 
tion will find no difficulty in stopping brev/ing.” 

It has been difficult to find out if foodstuffs are being used to make munition 
alcohol. If they are, the President is not only authorized but “ directed ” to save 
such waste of food by commandeering for redistilling, whiskey on hand. The 
question of fact seems now to be settled. The Patriot Phalanx of July 5, 1918, 
prints a news item from Peoris, which says: “ Corn is being purchased in large 
quantities and rushed to the plants ”—that is, the distilleries that have been for¬ 
bidden to manufacture beverage whiskey and are now making munition alcohol. 

Dr. Carl Alsberg, Chief of the Bureau of Chemistry, stated to the editor of 
this brief that early in the war he gave the estimate that cost of redistilling 
whiskey into munition alcohol would not be more than one and a half cents per 
gallon. The expense might be slightly more now, but nothing worthy to be 
considered, nor even the extra cost of whiskey, in comparison to the saving to 
the nation by stopping the traffic. If whiskey could not be sold as a beverage 
after Dec. 31, 1918, it would be natural that those who had whiskey on hand at 
the last might have to lose on the left over stock a considerable part of the 400 
per cent increased price added by the economic effect of the previous act of 
Congress in stopping manufacture. It is probable, however, they would get 
nearly if not quite the half value, which would redeem the whiskey securities. 
The Administration has power in any case to pay enough to avert a general bank 
disturbance if necessary, and whole value of whiskey securities if paid wotdd 
he saved in cutting off for one year the money spent in saloons. 

The Plea for Wine. 

A double plea is made by representatives of California wine interests, first, 
that fruit is not of great importance in the food conservation scheme; and, sec¬ 
ond, that wine and beer are harmless “ temperance drinks.” 

As to the plea for exemption because fruit is not as much needed as wheat 
and meat, the answer is that it is not so much food as man-power that we need 
to save, and therefore, the important thing is to get rid of the saloon, and to 
do that we cut off wine, as well as its boon companions, whiskey and beer. The 
weakest wine is stronger than the strongest beer, and the strongest wine is nearly 
as strong as whiskey. Most of the drink tragedies of history have been due to 
wine, for whiskey and beer are relatively modern drinks. 

That there is much drunkenness in wine countries, and that even moderate 
use of wine reduces efficiency and injures health is fully shown in a paper by 
Miss Cora F. Stoddard of Scientific Temperance Federation (Congressional 
Record, June 27, 1917, p. 4741) from whose closing paragraphs we quote: 


WHY WAR PROHIBITION? 


43 


The Wine Way to Drunkenness Pictured. 

Vance Thompson, the well-known journalist, in his book on “ Drink,” speaks out 
of personal observation of what has happened in France and Italy: ‘ The greater part 
of my life I have lived in wine countries. Always one remembers the best of life; 
the dirty and tragic parts slip out of mind. And so with the wine lands. Go to the 
real facts of life—banish the haze of poetic fancy—and what you see is not the 
cannikin-clinking merriment of comic opera, but a sadder, drearier way of life. I am 
speaking of lands where the grapes grow, where wine is ‘natural, pure and cheap.’ It 
is there at its best. The alcohol, always a poison, is, in its least harmful form, con¬ 
cealed in the beneficent juice of the grape—hidden in suavity and perfume. And what 
it does to the race of men, dw^ellers in sunlight, you know; for you have shuddered at 
these crippled and distorted generations, with their beggars and idiots, bearing one 
and all—to the eye of the ph3’'siologist—the stigmata of alcoholic penalties. 

‘‘‘Let there be no doubt about it: the wine way to drunkenness is a way like any 
other. You say it is cleaner, with gayer prospects and brighter skies? Nine-tenths 
of that is cant and cheap apologia of second-rate, brandy-loosened peets. It is not a 
clean way; if you have followed the trail of the wine-drunkard, home-faring.’ 

“ If the United States really intends to stop waste of food and human power by 
alcohol, it must include the prohibition of the use of fruits as well as of grain in the 
manufacture of liquor for beverage purposes.” 

As to California grapes, it is admitted (p. 83) by Representative Kahn, of 
California, that they could be made into grape juice. And Representative Ran¬ 
dall of same State says the wine grapes, dried, may be fed to hogs—another 
case of “ raising more hogs and less hell.’' Mr. Kahn also said (p. 85) on 
June 17, 1918, that in four to five months “ they would be able to harvest their 
grapes and make their wine.” That was just about the time the bill before 
Congress, when the President interposed allowed in naming Nov. i, 1918, as the 
date for wine-making to cease. Mr. Randall called attention to the fact (p. 
133) that the two largest counties of California, from a wine-grape producing 
standpoint, are both “ dry,” save one city. Both voted as did the whole State, 
outside of San Francisco, for statewide prohibition, that would eliminate the 
wine-grape growing business entirely. And the Brewers’ Journal, July, 1918, 
contains this significant item: “The Valley Fruit Growers’ Association, which 
met in Fresno last month, adopted a resolution urging Governor Stephens to 
take measures looking to the closing of all saloons in California during the war.” 
Mr. Randall presented a telegraphic petition to Congress for war prohibition 
froin the California Fruit Growers’ Association in July, 1918. 

Vll\ WAR PROHIBITION IS NEEDED TO CONSERVE MONEY. 

The annual cost of drink and its consequences is shown in detail in Con¬ 
gressional Record of July 6, 1917, in speech of Senator W. H. Thompson. THE 
TOTAL IN ROUND NUMBERS, IS SIX BILLIONS OF DOLLARS— 
MORE THAN TWO LIBERTY LOANS. The average cost of drink and its 
consequences per family is $300. Think what it would mean not only to the 
nation and the world but to our homes in future habits of thrift, if eveiy 
drinker’s family should buy six of the $50 Liberty bonds! 

Whiskey Securities Bogie Shown to be Straw. 

Curiously enough a reform that would save six billion dollars a year, the 
direct and indirect cost of the drink, has been in danger of being blocked be¬ 
cause certain speculative whiskey securities held by careless banks might cause 
some inconvenience or loss to the new whiskey millionaries, who have vastly 
enriched themselves by the increased price of whiskey due to prohibition of 
manufacture when there were two years supplies on hand, and plenty of new 
work for distilleries in making munition alcohol and in other lines of war work. 
An ex-distiller, P. J. Falvey (p. 169) shows that the bugaboo is mostly straw 


44 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


which the representatives of these whiskey securities set up before the Senate 
Committee, frightening the very elect with prophecies of financial panic. Before 
Congress prohibited whiskey-making, distillers grew rich on the regular profit 
of from 5 to lo cents per gallon. As a result of prohibition of manufacture the 
profit rose in a year 400 per cent—to about $2.00 a gallion, on a price of 
making all who had 60,000 barrels or more at the time manufacture was 
stopped, millionaires. Those who have so enriched themselves are able to take 
care of all the whiskey securities, and if any bank has been so blind to the on¬ 
coming cyclone of prohibition as to invest largely in whiskey securities it de¬ 
serves to pay a good sum in losses as tuition in the school of experience. 

REPLYING TO STATEMENTS OF MR. PERCY H. JOHNSTON, (PP. 200-7) THAT TWO 

HUNDRED MILLIONS OF WHISKEY SECURITIES WERE HELD IN BANKING ESTABLISH¬ 
MENTS ON TWO HUNDRED MILLION GALLONS OF WHISKEY WORTH FIVE HUNDRED 
MILLION DOLLARS, IT IS SUFFICIENT TO SAY THAT THE PRESIDENT HAS POWER TO 
BUY IT FOR MUNITION PURPOSES TO SAVE THE PRECIOUS CORN AND OTHER GRAIN 
THAT IN JULY, 1918, WAS REPORTED IN THE PRESS AS BEING USED TO MAKE 
MUNITION ALCOHOL. IT MAY NOT BE THE MOST ECONOMICAL WAY FOR THE 
GOVERNMENT TO GET THE MUNITION ALCOHOL, NOR THE MOST PROFITABLE WAY 
FOR SPECULATORS TO SELL WHISKEY BUT THE WHISKEY MAKERS AND THE GOV¬ 
ERNMENT MAY BETTER LOSE SOMETHING THAN HAVE THE NATION LONGER RISK 
THE LOSING OF THE WAR BY CONTINUING THE LOSSES THROUGH BOOZE OF FOOD, 
FUEL, MONEY, TRANSPORTATION, MAN-POWER AND MORALE. 

Liquor Revenues Paid By Consumers. 

Closely related to cost of drink is the question of revenue. It is amazing 
that any business man ever thought saloon licenses a real asset of City, State or 
Nation. It is only by a fictitious personification of “ the Government,” forgetting 
that U. S. is US, that anybody could be brought to think a traffic that costs US 
six billions,^ and pays back, even under war taxation, including all national. State 
and local liquor taxes and license fees, only a devil’s tithe of that, is anything 
else^ than a crazy liability. All liquor taxes and license fees were given by 
National Herald, a liquor paper, on March 6, 1915, as three hundred and twenty 
five millions. Brewers’ Journal, July, 1918, gives seven hundred millions. The 
liquor traffic cost us eight and one-half times as much as that at peace prices. It 
is at least ten times as much now, for not only drinks but their consequences 
are more costly. Where would we put a man found on the street buying dimes at 
a dollar a piece? That is what Uncle Sam is doing and there are Senators even 
from prohibition States that urge the need of the big liquor revenues in war as a 
reason for continuing our self robbery. 

But here is what was said by a Kentucky Senator, J. C. W. Beckham, on May 
12, 1917, as to liquor revenue: 

‘‘ Many are^ inclined to think that the liquor industry pays a revenue in this coun¬ 
try, in Nation, in State, in county, and in municipality. As a matter of fact, the liquor 
industry pays no revenue at all. It is merely, to a small extent, a tax collector, and 
it is the worst tax collector ever known. Those enj^aged in the manufacture and in 
the sale of alcoholic liquors pay no taxes except what they collect from the con¬ 
sumers.” 

Compensation Due From, Not to Saloons. 

The plea for compensation should also be placed on the background of the 
vast cost of the liquor traffic not only to the liquor drinkers but to the “ innocent 
bystander ” who pays the cost for the crime and poverty and inefficiency caused 
by drink. The court decisions bearing on compensation are printed in hearing 
on pp. 179-182, and are in substance that a license is of the same nature as an 


WHY WAR PROHIBITION? 


45 


annual lease and gives no rights beyond the year, nor even to year’s end if 
public welfare requires its cancellation.* 

Civil damage suits establish clearly that there are damages done by drink 
for which compensation can be recovered, and it would be an interesting contest 
to sue a saloon that was asking compensation because prohibition was soon to 
prevent renewal of its license, for the specific damages it had done to surround¬ 
ing families and factories and real estate values, and to the community generally 
in the taxes it could be shown to have caused and in the cost of the criminals and 
paupers it had made. If there is much more talk about compensation, some one 
may try it out in the courts whether some large compensations due from saloons 
are not collectable. 


VIII. WAR PROHIBITION IS NEEDED TO STRENGTHEN OUR 
VOTING LINE, AND SO THE DEMOCRACY FOR WHICH WE 
SEEK TO MAKE THE WORLD “ SAFE.” 


Next to the Kaiser, the greatest menace to American democracy is the traffic 
that financed the German-American Alliance, which last has committed hari-kari 
to avoid execution by Congress. But Congress is proceeding deliberately to kill 
it again for keeps. Without a word of discussion, on a record vote, the Senate 
adopted the resolution of Senator King of Utah, annulling the Federal character 
of the Alliance. The House and President concurred. Shall we stultify ourselves 
sparing the Association for which the Alliance acted both in pro-Germanism 
and anti-prohibitionism ? 

That there are many of German stock who are true Americans we can not 
easily forget when the roll of our war-work leaders includes such German names 
as Stettinus, Goethals, Baruch, Rosenwald, Warburg, Schwab and Frankfurter. 
And from pro-German families young men of undoubted loyalty have gone to the 
firing line, and should not be held responsible for the sins or mistakes of their 
fathers. 

But the German brewers, who backed the Alliance, though they have tried to 
camouflage with Liberty loans and Red Cross contributions, are too fully un¬ 
covered by the .Senate investigation to pass as patriots among intelligent citizens. 

Mr. Wayne B. Wheeler presented to the Senate Committee on Agriculture 
(p. Ill) the following analysis of the evidence in hearings in 1918 before 
Senate Judiciary Sub-Committee on the German-American Alliance. (The 
figures in this case refer to that hearing) : 

Charter provisions of German-American Alliance granted by Congress, 1907, to 
study American institutions, to cultivate German language, to protect civil and political 
rights, to perpetuate the memory of German pioneers, and assist in naturalization, etc, 
(p. 6). 

The German Alliance violated its charter (pp 11-642, and in the manner herein¬ 


after set forth). . . 

It organized Germans in alliance to carry out the plans of the organization and 
thus hinder the purpose of the government to become a more perfect union (pp. 32 , 
37, 38, 692). . , ^ . . . . , 

Opposed assimilation of Germans in America and was pro-German in activities (pp. 
24. 53, 54, 108, 110, 117, 118, 635-643). ^ , 

Attempted to force the compulsory teaching of German m elementary public 
schools to Germanize America (pp. 24, 44, 49, 100, 187-659). 

Alliance encouraged German press to carry out its program (pp. 42-696). 
Promoted German ideals and exalted German kultur (pp. 11, 25, 26, 652-658). 
Entered politics to elect officials friendly to alliance program (pp. 31, 47, 7, 33, 35 , 
65, 107, 124, 128, 306).__ 


* riif* fitatement that in Nevada responsible temperance leaders and liquor dealers have agreed on a 
compromise by which the latter will consent to prohibition and the former to a 75 per cent compensatioc 
is denied by the Anti-Saloon Beague. 





46 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


Aroused prejudice against England and other friendly nations (pp. 14 - 65 ). 

Raised money for German Red Cross (pp. 76 , 249 , 253 , 265 - 271 ). 

Opposed making the speaking of English condition for voting (p. 21). 

Opposed loan to allies (pp. 38 , 112, 115 ). 

Called our government a failure (p. 309 ). 

The Kaiser decorated the president of the alliance for his services to Germany 
(p. 84 ). 

Encouraged disloyalty to oath (pp. 37 - 61 ). 

Opposed war program (pp. 41 , 55 , 79 , 112, 115 , 118 - 139 ). 

Ally of Pan-German Alliance in its plan for German world domination (pp. 11, 
47 , 95 - 694 ). 

Opposed prohibition (pp. 25 , 27 , 36 , 223 - 648 ). 

United States Brewers’ Association furnished money to the German Alliance 
through the National Association of Commerce and Labor (pp. 205 , 206 - 208 ). 

Senator Wolcott asked the following questions (p. 208 ); 

Senator Wolcott. Then this organization,^ of which you were the head, the Na¬ 
tional Association of Commerce and Labor, interested primarily in combating pro¬ 
hibition, was to the extent you have indicated to operate through the German-American 
Alliance, you supplying simply the funds and they conducting the propaganda which 
you were primarily interested in? That was the situation, was it not? 

Mr. Andreae. Yes; I think that is correctly stated. 

Page 216 , Senator Wolcott asked this further question: 

Senator Wolcott. So that the activities that you have been describing, carried 
on through the German-American Alliance, were emanating in the last analysis from 
the United States Brewers’ Association? 

Mr. Andrerae. Oh, yes; the funds—and the allied trades. (See also citations by 
Senator Sheppard in Cong. Record of July 6, 1917 .) 

Having read this brief of evidence, Mr. Wheeler said at Senate hearing on war 
prohibition: “If there is an organization in this country that is backed by the liquor 
traffic and that organization or alliance carries on a propaganda that hinders this 
Nation in winning the war, thus crippling the efforts of the Army and Navy, surely 
you are supporting the Army and Navy when you prohibit the traffic that supports 
this unpatriotic organization. 

Ex-President Roosevelt, in an editorial in the Kansas City Star, July lO, 
1918, had this to say of the German-American Alliance: 

“ It received money from the Brewers’ Association for the campaign against pro¬ 
hibition. 

“ At this time when the campaign of German^ frightfulness is in full blast, when 
the Prussianized Germany of the Hohenzollerns is steadily adding to its list of lit¬ 
erally unforgivable offenses against civilization, THERE IS NO ROOM IN THIS 
COUNTRY FOR ANY ORGANIZATION, GREAT OR SMALL, WHICH EITHER 
DEFENDS. GERMANY OR IS LUKEWARM IN THE GREAT CRUSADE 
AGAINST HER IN WHICPI AMERICA WILL HENCEFORTH PLAY A LEAD¬ 
ING PART.” (That means not only the Alliance but U. S. Brewers’ Association.) 

More Investigations of Brewers’ Frightfulness. 

It is pertinent to say at this point that Congress having found by the in¬ 
vestigations of the German-American Alliance that its pro-German as well as 
anti-prohibition activities were financed by national organizations of liquor deal¬ 
ers, should proceed to investigate the party “ higher up,” and his secret political 
activities in restraint of officials and citizens: for example, the brewers auxiliary 
whose business it is to boycott business men who in the exercise of their civil 
rights close saloons opposite their own factories or petition Congress for prohibi¬ 
tion, or contribute to anti-saloon campaigns; and the auxiliary whose business it 
is to kill politically any official who, under his oath to serve the public welfare, 
votes to close saloons or interferes as an executive with their habitual law¬ 
breaking ; and the agencies that are generously financed to secure the co-operation 
of black preachers in the South, and white labor leaders in the North in order to 
control for the saloons the labor vote. It is positively known to many that there 
are proofs of such treasonable plots in the carload of evidence seized by the 


WHY WAR PROHIBITION? 


47 


Government at the time brewers paid $70,000 fines on charge of using a million 
dollars to corrupt Pennsylvania elections. It would not be fair to stop with 
uncovering the political conspiracies of German-Americans and keep in hiding 
professedly patriotic Americans who have aided the brewers to corrupt elections, 
the very heart of the democracy that we are fighting for, which is even worse 
than trying to Germanize us and keep us out of the war. 

Even when saloon men are not pro-German they are usually partners in the 
treason of seeking to dominate politics in order to shield their own trade in 
wrong doing. 

Ex-President Taft, in an article in Philadelphia Public Ledger in November, 
1917, said: 

“ The anti-liquor sentiment in Ohio has grown stronger in recent years, not only 
on the merits of the question, but also because of resentment at the brazen political 
dictation by the saloonkeepers.” 

Is War Prohibition a Real Conservation Measure? 

Right here, with quotations from two ex-presidents fresh in mind, is a good 
place to answer the oft-repeated charge that war prohibitionists are not really 
seeking conservation but only taking advantage of the war to force prohibition. 
Ex-Presidents Roosevelt and Taft are but two of thousands who have newly 
come to prohibition through patriotism. Some of the most ardent prohibitionists 
proposed at first to drop prohibition for the war, but were called back to it by 
seeing through the words of Lloyd George and others that it was a war measure 
of the first magnitude, needed to conserve food, fuel, money, man-power and 
“ morale.*' 

IX. WAR PROHIBITION IS NEEDED TO CONSERVE PURITY AND 
THE FAMILY. 

It was never so generally known as now that wine and beer, no less than 
whiskey, are the ushers to venerial diseases. In the Spanish-American war a 
score of the foremost American doctors signed a statement that it was during 
partial intoxication from beer and wine that young men were especially liable 
to the temptations whose end is the way of death. 

Plere it is appropriate to introduce the report of an investigation of the 
moral condition of American troops abroad, made in 1918 by Bishop James 
Cannon, Jr., and Dr. E. J. Moore, in behalf of the Anti-Saloon League, with the 
approval of the Secretaries of the Army and Navy. They found most of our 
soldiers clean, sober and efficient, and commanding officers deeply concerned 
for the morals of the men, and seeking to divert their attention when off duty 
with social, recreational and educational features. But in spite of the efforts of 
the officers, and the wonderful aid rendered by Y. M. C. A. and similar organiza¬ 
tions, they report there is much wine and beer drinking—more than in canton¬ 
ments over here.” The report states that there has been drinking to excess 
in London and Paris and the port cities especially, which sometimes has been 
so great as to cause very unfavorable comment. Such drinking has been accom¬ 
panied, as is usually the case, with sexual immorality, as a result of which in 
some sections ‘'venereal disease was reaching a percentage larger than could 
be ignored.” * It appears that in proportion to numbers there has been a greater 
amount of drinking to excess, and of immorality among the officers than among 
the men. This appears to be due to the fact that in the creation of such a large 
body of officers, it has happened, as might have been expected, that many have 
been commissioned who have been lacking in discr etion and self- c ontrol. When 

* See footnotes p. 23 of this book. 





48 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


freed from the restraint of the American prohibitory law against intoxicants 
and prostitution, and given the freedom which officers have in France, such men 
have not restrained themselves, but have indulged their appetites to the detriment 
of discipline among the men under them, to the dishonor of the American uni¬ 
form, which, to the praise of the higher officers be it said, has resulted in the 
discharge of some of them from the Navv and Army.” 

“ GENERAL ORDER NO. 77, HAS BEEN HELPFUL, BUT HAS NOT CONTROLLED THE 
EVILS. THE EXEMPTION OF LIGHT WINES AND BEER IS A DISTINCT LOWERING OF 
THE STANDARD SET FOR THE ARMY AND NAVY BY CONGRESSIONAL ACTION,§ AND 
WHATEVER GOOD HAS RESULTED FROM THE REST OF THE ORDER, THE EXEMPTION 
OF LIGHT WINES AND BEER HAS NOT ONLY PRODUCED NO RESULTS TO COM- 
PENSATE FOR THE PUBLIC OFFICIAL LOWERING OF THE AMERICAN PROHIBITORY 
STANDARD, BUT ON THE CONTRARY THE DRINKING OF WINE AND BEER HAVE UN¬ 
DOUBTEDLY BEEN INCREASED BY THE ORDER, AND MEN ARE FORMING WINE-DRINK- 
ING HABITS WHICH WILL PLAGUE THEM FOR LIFE. FURTHERMORE, UNDER THE 
COVER OF THE PERMIT TO DRINK WINE, THE STRONGER LIQUORS ARE FREQUENTLY 
PURCHASED WITHOUT DETECTION OR PUNISHMENT.” 

The most patent moral of the report of Messrs. Cannon and Moore is that 
General Pershing’s order issued in December, 1917, permitting our soldiers to 
“ buy or receive as a gift wine and beer ” should be repealed. It should encourage 
us to demand it that General Biddle’s similar order, issued in February, 1918, 
allowing the soldier in this country to drink anything when at home, on leave, or 
when “ a bona fide guest ” anywhere was revoked in July, 1918. It has taken 
many wrecks of young lives to show the folly of such a personal license to drink, 
which was plainly contrary to the intent of Congress, as is also the Pershing order. 

Not alone the War Department has made mistakes in this matter but parents, 
preachers and reformers also have made a great mistake in not protesting ir- 
resistably against both of these executive modifications of the law of Congress, 
lest some shallow fellow should accuse them of “ not standing by the President 
or distrusting our soldiers.” We should have stood by Congress and the soldier. 

X. WAR PROHIBITION IS NEEDED TO PREVENT A CHECKMAT¬ 
ING OF THE WAR MISSION^ OF THE CHURCHES, WHICH IS TO 
MAINTAIN “MORALE,” THAT NAPOLEON SAID WAS THREE 
TIMES AS IMPORTANT AS MUNITIONS. 

And what is “ morale ” ? It is esprit du corps, the spirit of an army and a 
nation—it is hope and courage, based on faith in a God of righteousness. Every 
saloon is a hindrance to the maintenance of that great essential in dark hours 
of war. The saloon dries up the top of the brain, the idealism of service and 
sacrifice, and leaves only the gross selfishness of the beast and savage that waits 
for its opportunity to despoil and destroy. That is what beer drinking of all 
classes at all ages of life has done for Germany, and it has done the same for 
people of like habits here. What has made Germany what it is we shall find it 
easier now than formerly to persuade patriotic to cut out of our national life. 

Rev. Clarence True Wilson, D. D., General Secretary of the Board of 
Temperance, Prohibition and Public Morals of the Methodist Episcopal Church 
of the United States, in a written statement submitted, without reading, for 
publication in hearings (p. 172), spoke of the fundamental relations of war 
prohibition to “ morale ” and religion as follows: 

War prohibition as the next step in the winning of the war does not depend on 
any secular argument whatever. It arises personally from a century of teachings, 
from the moral convictions of a hundred million people, from the growing revulsion 

§ The Brewers’ Journal of August, 1017, p. 403, said: “Pershing acts for the best of his men and 
his country, ‘ law ’ or no ‘ law.’ ” 



WHY WAR PROHIBITION? 


49 


toward the traffic, growing out of the fact that alcohol is not a food but a poison; 
that its manufacture is not a business but a crime; that it belongs in the class with 
the gambling hell and the brothel which civilization has outgrown and must destroy; 
and the plea for national prohibition at this time, while we are at war with Germany, 
and when Germany has gone dry, taking over every one of her big breweries to make 
ammunition or food or clothing of some commodity for the army or for the winning 
of the war, is not a mere opportunist’s plan to add a little efficiency to our Army, but 
is a plea on behalf of the morals of the Nation and the morale of the Army, that is 
absolutely essential to the winning of the war and to deserving to win the war. 

The essential question is not, if we should stop the breweries now making beer, 
would they not make soft drinks instead? The question is. If it is a part of God’s 
purpose in the great world war to wipe the nations of the earth clean from their 
several drug poisons, which have debauched mankind too long and been tolerated 
simply for revenue; if what the German Emperor himself said, addressing his officers 
in army and navy five years ago, that “The next war will be settled by nerve; that 
nerves are continually undermined by alcohol; and that therefore the nation that uses 
the least alcohol will be the conquering nation in the next war, and the nation that 
uses the most alcohol will be the one that goes down first”; if the fact that Belgium 
was the largest drinker of intoxicating liquor in the whole world, and that that much 
of that prophecy has come true, what will become of the land that, in view of all 
the light and all the knowledge and the moral convictions of the people, and sensitive¬ 
ness of the national conscience on the subject, persist through its rulers in tolerating 
the most gigantic, iniquitous, impudent, pro-German trade that could be tolerated in 
he world, and with a great outcry against the wasting of people’s substance and the 
ruin of their souls during war times, our President should determine, or our Congress 
should so neglect the subject, that we should struggle on through this battle without 
giving our boys the utmost help we can by stopping this waste at home and this 
devastation abroad? 

What if, as in the case with Lincoln, God w'ould withhold victory from our troops 
as He did those of the Federal troops while we had any complicity with slavery until 
Lincoln promised the Almighty, if He would drive the Confederate Army out of Penn¬ 
sylvania, he would free his slaves, and after that was done a series of victories led up 
to the culmination that kept Old Glory’s stainless stars flying in the heavens? 

And what if the divine purpose be to purify the world by this war our government 
should be the last to prohibit this national evil and should hold onto the iniquitious 
liquor traffic until we are taught by the loss of millions of lives that it does not pay to 
trifle with the God of the universe, or with the moralities that He is seeking to teach, 
or with the religious principles that have blessed society, and which are peremptory 
in their demands? 

I tremble for my country wffien I remember that God is just, that He has spoken 
in His word, and speaks by His providence, by the movements of these States as well 
as among the nations of the earth, against the liquor traffic; and when I see our 
ruling powers standing today as the defender of that colossal assault on humanity 
known as the organized brewers, pro-German in their sentiment and organization and 
conducting a destructive trade, which becomes a practical ally of the Kaiser in his 
assault on Christian civilization. This partnership was clearly brought out in the 
investigation of the German-American Alliance. 

I, perhaps, travel this continent as many times across and as many miles per year 
as any man in it. I talk to and with as many people and have as good opportunity to 
feel the popular and moral pulse. There are two conflicting emotions, both very tense 
today in America. One is the patriotic desire to win and to contribute toward winning 
this war. The other is a dreadful apprehension that we will not do our utmost in 
time to win or deserve to win a quick victory and so lose the lives of millions of our 
boys. This second apprehension has grown through the moral convictions of the 

There are millions of Americans who do not believe that this administration can 
win this war or deserve to win it with the beer industry hanging like a millstone 
about its neck, turning our “ daily bread ” into human poison, tying up labor into use¬ 
less activity, slowing our workmen into heavy beer brutes, wasting two billions an¬ 
nually organizing temptations for our soldiers and spoiling the morale of our people 
in war times. President Wilson can stop this diversion of resources into a pro- 
German and disloyal trade, or Congress can do it as a war measure absolutely de¬ 
manded by our people. If either does they will have the thanks of the united Church 


50 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


of Christ, the thanks of the fathers and mothers who are giving their boys, the thanks 
of American business men who, amid sacrifice of taxes, gifts, and of helpers, are con¬ 
ducting “ business as usual ” amid fearful handicaps. But if this war drags its weary 
length through another year and the American people get the conviction that our lack 
of food and munitions, transports, preparations, and victories are in any way con¬ 
nected with the waste and ruin of the American tolerated beer trade, the reprobation 
of this short-sighted pro-beer policy bringing upon our Nation the moral culpability 
of standing on the wrong side on the greatest moral issue of the twentieth century 
will develop ino tthe darkest cloud that ever broke over the head of human rulers for 
failing to apprehend the signs of the times, the providence of God and the divine 
purpose to clean up our world, especially to wipe from it the curse of the drug poisons 
of the nations. 

“YE SHALL BE ASHAMED OF YOUR REVENUES BECAUSE OF THE 
FIERCE ANGER OF THE LORD.” (Jer., 12 : 13 .) DO WE THINK GOD IS 
GOING TO GIVE VICTORY IN THE WORLD WAR AND LEAVE THE 
MORAL CONDITIONS NO BETTER THAN BEFORE THE WAR CAME? 


War Prohibition Amendment to H. R. 11945 as Reported, by Senate Com¬ 
mittee ON Agriculture in August, 1918.* 

After Dec. 31, 1918, until the conclusion of the present war for the purpose 
of conserving the man power of the nation and to increase efficiency in the pro¬ 
duction of arms, war munitions, ships, food and clothing for the Army and Navy, 
it shall be unlawful to sell for beverage purposes any distilled spirits, and during 
said time no distilled spirits held in bond shall be removed therefrom for beverage 
purposes, except for export. After Nov. i, 1918, until the conclusion of the 
present war, no grain, cereal, fruit, or other food product shall be used in the manu¬ 
facture or production of beer, wine, or other intoxicating malt or vinous liquor 
for beverage purposes. After Dec. i, 1918, until the conclusion of the present 
war and demohiliBation, no beer, wine or other intoxicating malt or vinous liquor 
shall be sold for beverage purposes, except for export. The Commisisoner of 
Internal Revenue is hereby authorized and directed to prescribe rules and regula¬ 
tions subject to the approval of the Secretary of the Treasury, in regard to the 
removal of distilled spirits held in bond after December thirty-first, nineteen 
hundred and eighteen, for other than beverage purposes, also in regard to the 
sale and distribution of wine for sacramental, medicinal, or other nonbeverage 
uses. After the approval of this Act, no distilled, malt, vinous, or other intoxi¬ 
cating liquors shall be imported (into the United States). 

Any person who violates any of the foregoing provisions shall be deemed 
guilty of a misdemeanor and upon conviction thereof shall be punished by a fine 
not exceeding $1,000 or by imprisonment not exceeding one year, or both. 

*The amendment as drawn for presentation to the Committee by the International Reform Bureau and 
Senator Geo. W. Norris included the period of demobilization and prohibited liquor exports. These two 
features were cut out by the Committee. After the President’s interposition, asking delay of war 
prohibition until 1920, Senator Sheppard offered a revised amendment which included demobilization, but 
postponed the date when the manufacture of intoxicating beverages should end from Nov. 1, 1918, to 
May 1, 1919, and date when all liquor selling for beverage purposes should end from January 1, 1919, 
to Juljr 1, 1919. The President was given discretionary power to put unlimited prohibition zones about 
coal mines, munition plants and other industrial war agencies, thus honoring workers by putting about 
them the same safeguards of their efficiency as was previously authorized for soldiers. (An effort was 
at once made by the International Reform Bureau, with result pending as book went to press, to make 
prohibition for five miles about coal mines mandatory for October and November, 1918, to avert fuel 
crisis.) The Sheppard amendment was adopted by the Senate August 29, 1918, and by the House 
September 23, but the Act of which it is a part was in Conference when the first edition of this book 
went to press, September 26, 1918. 




WHY INTERNATIONAL PROHIBITION? 


51 


Why International Prohibition? 

There was never a time so favorable for international prohibition as now, 
when thirty nations—soon to be forty—are acting together as Allies 
to conquer War, in behalf of Law. Surely at such a time we cannot forget 
the words of Gladstone, that drink has done more harm to the world than 
war, pestilence and famine. For four thousand years the world’s prophets 
have made such declarations, some in every continent, and only the elect 
have heard and heeded, but war’s “ curtain of fire ” turned such a lurid light 
on Drink as the foe in the rear in every land, that millions who had seen no 
harm in drinking that stops short of drunkenness, learned in war news and 
war industries what the great scientists of Europe long since proved to the 
few that had ears to hear and eyes to see, that even such daily tippling as 
is commonly called “ moderate ” seriously lowers efficiency in both soldiers 
and workmen, and at the same time wastes national resources of food and 
fuel and transportation and money and “ morale.” 

Never before in any war have the leaders on both sides branded Drink 
as an enemy to be interned or put under surveillance and restriction, as every 
belligerant nation did at the very outset of this war. 

War Prohibitions in Central Powers. 

Germany’s great general, Von Moltke, had said before the war, “ Ger¬ 
many has more to fear from beer than from all the armies of France.” And 
the Kaiser had said to his naval cadets, in 1911 : The nation that drinks the 
least alcohol will win the next war, for modern war calls for steady nerves 
and a cool head, and alcohol kills nerve.” It was therefore no surprise when 
he issued an order at the first mobilization of his troops in 1914 , that in part¬ 
ing gifts to German soldiers from their friends there should be no intoxicants. 
And about the same time he prohibited the sale of distilled liquors altogether, 
whether for soldier or civilian, and reduced the alcoholic content of beer. 
Later, in January, 1918 , when the choice was beer or bread, he cut off barley 
for brewing altogether, according to the Brewers’ Journal of the following 
month. That the plunder of Belgian and French wine cellars by German 
soldiers in their first rush toward Paris fatally delayed their march and 
weakened their “ morale ” is plainly intimated by German and French writers, 
and bv Mr. Brand Whitlock, American Minister to Belgium—none of these 
writers prohibitionists. The story of that staggering march to Paris, as 
written in the diary of a German officer, recalls Adjutant General Corbin’s 
remark which he confirmed in a conversation with me during the war with 
Spain. “ A beer canteen is a good thing for the camp of your enemy.” 

Austria-Hungary was reported in the Brewers’ Journal in 1918 as having 
almost ceased the use of grain for liquors, because it was all needed for bread 
in what was then called by the new name of “ Austria-Hungry.” 

Bulgaria was in less need of drink restriction, because, according to Guy 
Havler in “Prohibition Advance in All Lands” (p. 140 ), Bulgaria before 
the'war drank onlv one-eighth as much spirits per capita as Germany. (Per¬ 
haps that was one' reason why one in each thousand people in Bulgaria lived 


52 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


to be a hundred years or more, and only one in seven hundred-thousand lived 
so long in Germany.) 

The fourth nation of the Central Powers, Turkey, is under Mohammedan 
prohibition, and although that good quality is accompanied by '' unspeakable '' 
faults, it has made Turkish soldiers, when well led, formidable fighters. 

So much for the Central Powers. In 1918 that side was “ drinking less 
alcohol than the Allies, and it was and will be a fact to be reckoned with, 
for the Kaiser’s opinion on war is certainly that of an expert. 

All the Allies to Some Extent Branded Drink as a Foe. 

All the Allies have also recognized intoxicating drinks as a handicap 
from the very inception of the war. 

Russia’s prohibition is not much talked about since its first fruits in 
revolution passed into the eclipse of social chaos, but we should know its 
great significance and make it known. 

Mr. Samuel Gompers in his frequent speeches in defense of beer, for 
which he admits he has no mandate from the American Federation of Labor— 
whose leaders in dry States are enthuisastic advocates of prohibition—makes 
ominous references to Russia as showing the horrible results of prohibition. 
But a close scrutiny of this sophistry shows it to be a boomerang. He 
charges the chaotic conditions in Russia are due to prohibition, meaning that 
it is a confirmation of his theory that if drink is taken from workingmen they 
will revolt. A revolt might be unfortunate in a democracy, but none but 
monarchists regard it unfortunate that sobered Russia revolted against auto¬ 
cracy. And sober Russia did it very calmly, with no resemblance to the 
carnival of blood that was seen in like case in France. Mr. Gompers, chal¬ 
lenged by Senator Kenyon, could give no authority for attributing any of 
the unwise acts of the revolutionists to prohibition. And it is very significant 
that of the various groups seeking to control the revolution in Russia, none 
have proposed to repeal prohibition, and only a slight relaxation of the law 
for the wine growing districts has been yielded. The Germans, taking good 
note that Russia drunken endured autocracy, seem to be putting what liquors 
they can command in the way of the peasants. And it is not strange that 
in days of riot, stores of liquors are sometimes broken open, Avhich may 
explain some of the orgies of rape and robbery that occurred when the sol¬ 
diers hurried back from the defense of their country to get their share of the 
confiscated goods of the rich. 

Meantime Russia will not forget the wonderful benefits that came from 
the first national prohibition law among white races. (Let it not be for¬ 
gotten that the Czar did three of the noblest acts that a nation’s ruler ever 
did—originated the Hague Court and gave his people a parliament and 
prohibition.) 

The Czar, knowing well that Russian vodka had been the ally of Japan 
in Russia’s ignominous defeat by a much smaller nation, followed his declara¬ 
tion of war against Germany with a prohibition of the sale of intoxicating 
liquors during mobilization. The army was marshalled so much more 
swiftly and quietly, and the effects on industry Avere so great, increasing 
efficiency of miners and workmen twenty to forty per cent (see Ernest Gor¬ 
don’s “Russia”), and the increase of savings also was so great—as much 
put in savings banks in one month in war time as in the whole period of the 
previous year—that the Duma made the temporary military prohibition a 


WHY INTERNATIONAL PROHIBITION? 5.'} 

permanent law. Benefits so multiplied in cleaner and more orderly villages, 
a sober soldiery and general improvement that the Chancellor of the Ex¬ 
chequer uttered those imperishable words: “ RUSSIA WITHOUT VODKA 
AND WITH WAR IS BETTER OFF THAN RUSSIA WITHOUT WAR 
AND WITH VODKA.'' 

^ xAnd a wife and mother speaking for the homes, though war widows and 
orphans were on every side, said, “ Russia is like heaven without vodka." 

Neither Russia nor the world can forget the wonderful benefits of that 
national prohibition, which belongs with the shorter experiment in national 
prohibition in Sweden during the general strike of 1909, that I shall describe 
later. Both Russia and Sweden gave unanswerable proofs of the manifold 
benefits of prohibition on a national scale—which would be greater still if 
the xAllies should unitedly adopt prohibition for increased efficiency in war 
and peace. 

Others of the Allied Governments that counted themselves superior to 
Russia, hesitated and paltered and surrendered to the liquor power in politics, 
excepting only Rumania, which went dry the very day it decided to fight, as 
every nation should, in accordance with the athletic rules that date back to 
the Olympic games of Greece. That country should need no argument to 
show that “ Greek wine " will not help Greek fighting. 

Men of light and leading in France, whom we should reenforce, urged 
war prohibition at the start. Generals in 1914 forbade civilians to sell wine 
to soldiers, but the Wine and Brandy Interest, that rules French politics 
ominously, carried the case to the courts, as the liquor interest has so often 
done in the United States, and it was decided that military officers had no 
power to forbid civilians to debauch and disable their soldiers. It was not 
until 1917 that even so small a protection of soldiers w^as allowed as the 
generals had attempted as a matter of war efficiency three years before. 
About the only results that came from declarations of President Poincare 
and General Joffre and Dr. Debove, the health chief of France, in favor of war 
prohibition, was a ban put on absinthe. France did not even respect the act 
of Congress through wffiich the American people forbade the sale of liquors 
by American civilians to American soldiers, but presented a great supply of 
wine to our soldiers in France on Bastile Day in July, 1917. It was prob¬ 
ably because of an unwdse fear of seeming discourtesy to an esteemed ally 
that the gift w^as accepted by General Pershing. And, probably for the same 
reason, in December, 1917, he issued General Order 77, which permitted 
American soldiers to buy or receive as a gift, wdne and beer." And, for 
the same inadequate reason, the American people have mostly only whispered 
their bitter and increasing disappointment that a nation famous for courtesy 
and courage has so discourteously disregarded the officially expressed senti¬ 
ment of a nation that was sacrificing so much in its defense. 

The wrecks of many American soldiers, through “ wine and women "— 
drink and diseases to which it is now better known than ever that drink 
leads—was proved to the American people in the unchallenged report of 
Bishop James Cannon, Jr., and Dr. E. J. Moore, who investigated moral con¬ 
ditions in Britain and France in 1918 for the Anti-Saloon League, at the 
request also of the Secretaries of the War and Navy (pp. 46-7). Unless 
French leaders are hopelessly blinded by the Wine and Brandy Interest, they 
wdll not treat as negligibly the smothered indignation of the most influential 
elements of the American people at this strange return for our reenforce- 


54 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


merit. I^et them take note that although Americans say little during the war, 
the volcano will burst at the war’s end when debauched soldiers come back, 
and when France will need for the building of its devastated country, no 
less than now, American good will and loans. It will need them far more 
than it will need the good will of its Brandy and Wine Interests, whose tol¬ 
erated waste of resources will then be regarded as a reason why Americans 
should not continue to make sacrifices for those unwilling to sacrifice even 
what is an injury to them and to all who share their fate. 

And Britain should note that Dr. Moore, in a postscript to that most in¬ 
fluential report, says: 

“I THANK GOD WITH ALL MY HEART THAT THIS WAR IS 
BEING FOUGHT ON FRENCH SOIL, AND NOT ON BRITISH SOIL, 
AND THAT OUR MEN ARE NOT SUBJECT TO THE MORAL CON¬ 
DITIONS AND ENVIRONMENT OF BRITAIN TODAY.” 

That intimation that in the “ wine and women ” business Britain is now 
worse than France, we may hope will pierce to the quick of a Government that 
has been unmoved by the appeals for war prohibition from the noble army of 
its foremost men and women in the ‘'Strength of Britain Alovement,” and the 
prophet-like books of Arthur Mee, “ Defeat or Victory,” “ The Fiddlers,” and 
“The Parasite,” all of them much read and much approved in the United 
States—all of which, in spite of the censor’s ban, have also become known in 
Canada, and with the added facts of Canadian soldiers debauched, have 
shaken perilously the loyalty of the Dominion, as some of its brave leaders 
from the firing line have declared. 

We are glad to read, in the British Parliamentary reports, that one of the 
slight reductions in the official indulgences granted to Drink in igi8 was made 
partly “ out of deference to American opinion.” And there is a glint of hope also 
in the letter of Lloyd George to Mr. Daniel A. Poling (p. 24 ), that he is watching 
American action on war prohibition. If he must actually choose between beer 
and bread he assures us he will choose bread. 

Does he suppose that because Americans are not making much public com¬ 
plaint in war time, that the influential classes in the United States who have 
carried a three-fourths national prohibition already, and are soon to make it 
complete, have neither knowledge of, nor objection to the fact that while Ameri¬ 
cans have been urged to sacrifice in grain and money for our Allies, those Allies, 
both in France and Britain, have been using our precious grain to make beer, and 
in Britain, perhaps elsewhere, whiskey also. Our Government has even become 
partner in foreign brewing by buying and shipping malt (see American Issue, 
N. Y. Edition, July 27 , 1918 ). 

The liquor men do not allow Americans to forget these facts, for they are 
constantly arguing against domestic prohibition, that the grain we save supph^s 
other nations with materials for liquor making. 

Soon after we entered the war the chairman of the U. S. Senate Com¬ 
mittee on Agriculture agreed to offer an amendment to the Cummins Amend¬ 
ment (which prohibited use of grain to make beer or whiskey), forbidding 
also the export of grain for the same use, and it was clearly seen and said by 
Senators that such action would require foreign governments desiring our 
grain for their people to join us in prohibiting manufacture as it would be an 
intolerable evasion simply to use their own grain for beer and imported grain 
for their bread. Such legislation has been influentially asked of Congress, 
and American patience may at any time refuse to tolerate longer a situation 


WHY INTERNATIONAL PROHIBITION? 


55 


that requires sacrifice on one side of the sea to continue indulgence by 
drinkers and cowardice of officials on the other. 

Will Americans Forever Make Foreign Loans to Cover Liquor Waste? 

In August, 1918 , the American people were told in a statement of war 
expenses that we are ‘‘ loaning ten million dollars a day to our Allies,” which is 
at the rate of about four billions of dollars per year. While the war is on we 
may quietly pocket the injustice that our Allies are wasting more than we loan 
them in the cost and consequences of drink. BUT IS THERE ANY BRITISH 
OR FRENCH STATESMAN SO DULL THAT HE SUPPOSES THE 
AMERICAN PEOPLE WILL CONTINUE TO LOAD OUR CHILDREN’S 
CHILDREN WITH WAR DEBTS TO MAKE FOREIGN LOANS WHEN 
THE WAR ENDS—ALTHOUGH LOANS WILL BE NEEDED FOR RE¬ 
CONSTRUCTION HARDLY LESS THAN FOR WAR—IF BRITISH AND 
FRENCH STATESMEN REFUSE TO FOLLOW US IN THE MANIFEST 
DUTY OF CUTTING OFF DRINK, NOT ONLY AS A WASTE IN WAR 
TIME, BUT ALSO AS A PROMOTER, WHEN THE WAR ENDS OF 
SOCIAL REVOLUTION OF THE RUSSIAN TYPE, THAT CARRIES 
REPUDIATION OF DEBTS IN ITS TRAIN? 

Drunken Workmen More To Be Feared Than Sober Ones. 

It is commonly said that the British Government does not conserve the 
resources wasted in Drink because it fears the workmen will revolt. In reply 
to that reflection upon them by British workmen, a numerous plebiscite 
voted four to one for war prohibition in 1917. That is one answer, and a 
sufficient one, to the alleged fear of labor revolt in defense of beer, but an¬ 
other as conclusive is that BRITAIN WILL NEED A SOBER PEOPLE 
WHEN IT UNDERTAKES INDUSTRIAL RECONSTRUCTION AT 
THE CONCLUSION OF THE WAR. A DRUNKEN LABOR POPULA¬ 
TION AT THAT HOUR MIGHT BRING THE FIGHTING NEARER 
THAN FRANCE. 

In September, 1918, the United States enacted war prohibition. 

Let every intelligent patriot of Britain and France and Italy and Belgium, 
and of Allied countries press his own Government to make this prohibition inter¬ 
national. And let the neutral countries also join to make it unanimous. 

A League to Enforce Peace, to make future wars impossible, should be 
preceded by International Prohibition to eliminate in Britain, France, Bel¬ 
gium, Italy and elsewhere, before the war’s end upsets industry, the drink 
shops that may at that critical hour of excitement drive throngs of men who 
will be suddenly thrown out of work, or confronted with the competition of 
returning soldiers, into a bloody revolution. Bar rooms during industrial 
reconstruction would be as perilous as a torchlight procession in a powder 
mill. International prohibition would be a league to assure industrial 

PEACE. 

Come Into Peace Congress With Clean Hands. 

British statesmen especially should consider in advance the situation the 
British Empire will face when we bring Germany and Austria to judgment 
for their treatment of weaker peoples. 

Germany will no doubt devote herself publicly and privately to an effort 
to show the world every governmental wrong that can be charged to Britain, 
as an offset to the wrongs charged to Germany. Every international stain 


56 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


which then remains on British hands will weaken the Allies’ case. Britain 
will claim that whatever wrongs have been done in the past, she is now help¬ 
ing rather than exploiting the weaker races. She will proudly show that Brit¬ 
ish labor has written an after-the-war charter of world-wide liberty which even 
excels the new liberty map of the world made by President Wilson. Britain 
may also point to the final righting of the great opium wrong done to China. 

But what will Britain say of its Government-owned and Government- 
promoted liquor traffic in India, where the one great virtue of Plinduism, 
Buddhism and Mohammedism, their prohibition of Drink, has been overruled 
in spite of the earnest protest of natives and missionaries? What v/ill Britain 
say in defence of its debauching of the natives for liquor revenue, which has 
been promoted by British officials in India as if it were some worthy cause? 
What will Britain say of the accursed opium traffic under its own flag today 
in India, Ce 3 don, Straits Settlements and elsewhere? What will Britain say 
of shipments of tons of morphia from Edinburgh and London to Japan for 
smuggling into China? 

Britain will also have some hard work to do in explaining her crowding 
of drink upon the tribes of Africa for revenue, in the face of earnest protests 
of the native chiefs. What will Britain say that will satisfy her dry colonies 
and the United States in answer to the arraignment of her Government by 
Canadian leaders for many servile surrenders to the Beer and Whisky In¬ 
terest at the moral cost of her own soldiers and those of her Allies? 

Mr. B. A. Kearney, of Boston, Massachusetts, Secretary-Agent of the 
Hotel and Restaurant Employees’ International Alliance and the Bartenders’ 
International League of America, testifying before the Senate Agricultural 
Committee, said: 

‘‘ I live within a stone’s throw of the Cunard dock in East Boston where I 
see boats coming in daily unloading ale containing seven and eight per cent, 
alcohol. We are shipping grain to England and it is returning to us in ale, which 
can be purchased in Boston in any of the hotels, an indication that England 
herself continues to brew this beer and hrezv it front the grain that we send there!*' 

This statement v/as not challenged, nor another of like import in same 
hearing, p. 99, by Congressman Clarence E. Lea, of California, who, tes¬ 
tifying in behalf of the liquor interests, particular!}^ the wine interests, said: 

Our barley is being sent to France and England for the manufacture of 
beer there, and to a certain extent there is an inconsistency in our sending barley 
there for that purpose.” 

Let Britain put herself in our place and think how her people would feel 
if we used sacrificial supplies from her people for some use they generally 
disapproved. 

And let Britain think well whether she will give the liquor traffic in her 
own borders a prolonged lease of life by State purchase, at the cost of lowered 
esteem in the Unit'^d States and in her own dry colonies, at a time when 
the era of world-wdde prohibition is approaching, and when the day of judg¬ 
ment for nations in a world parliament is yet more imminent. 

When a bonding company has given bond for a man, it is the bonding 
company’s business whether he wastes his resources recklessl}^. America 
having loaned Great Britain billions of dollars, has a right to protest against 
the waste of man-power and food and fuel and transportation and na¬ 
tional “morale” which the long-continued sale of liquors to men and women 
in Great Britain would involve, including the disadvantage Britain would 


WHY INTERNATIONAL PROHIBITION? 


57 


suffer a creditor in manufactures and trade as against prohibition countries, 
and the increased probability of social revolution and repudiation of national 
debts if the working classes should be increasingly besotted. 

Let Belgium Get Ready For New Era. 

Americans have unbounded admiration for Belgium's heroic self-sacrifice 
in halting the Hun, when a condoning of the violation of international law 
might have saved her from spoilation and even enriched her with a German 
reward. And because of that admiration we have given millions to feed her 
people. But her statesmen should be telling her people that when peace 
comes and Belgium needs even more money to rebuild her waste places, 
Americans can hardly forget that Belgium has been the most beer-soaked 
nation in Europe. No doubt a part of the gifts of American abstainers have 
gone, directly or indirectly, to furnish beer to Belgians when it was all needed 
for bread. We have heard of no reduction of the liquor traffic there save 
what war has made; no movement for abstinence for which this period of 
sacrifice afforded a great opportunity. Let statesmen join with reformers 
in showing rich and poor alike at this time when Belgium must have the 
world’s co-operation, that she should cast aside this wasteful drink traffic and 
adopt the prohibition that Belgium’s socialists have long urged as a part of 
their plan of social uplift for the working classes. 

Let Brave Italy Strike Down the Foe in the Rear. 

Americans have admired Italy’s magnificent fight and have sent un¬ 
questioning aid in war time, but let her statesmen and reformers follow our 
lead in prohibition not only for their own good but also to hold our esteem 
and cooperation. Her leaders have condemned her wines, as well as stronger 
drinks, and if her statesmen are holding back for fear Italian workmen Avould 
‘‘ make trouble,” let them search American prohibition history to find any 
place where the hosts of Italian workmen or immigrants from any other 
foreign land have rebelled because the drink shops were closed. There was 
no trouble in Seattle or Spokane or Denver or Detroit, though Austrians and 
Hungarians and Poles as well as Italians were numerous in their great shops. 
Foreigners come here regular drinkers, soon become occasional drinkers 
through American influence, and are so prepared for “ bone dry ” prohibition, 
which they find brings only benefit, with new joys better than those of the 
fuddling bowl. 

The financial burden of the great war is not yet fully realized, for the 
people, though paying high prices and high taxes, are also getting high 
wages, most of which are from borrowed money that must be paid in taxes 
by this and future generations when wages have fallen, and war’s great 
appeal to service and sacrifice ” are past. 

STATESMEN IN EVERY LAND OUGPIT TO SEE THAT THE 
PERIOD WHEN SACRIFICE IS THE DAILY HABIT AND THE 
VERY SPIRIT OF THE NATION IS THE TIME TO DRAFT THE 
SELLERS AND DRINKERS OF INTOXICANTS INTO A WAY OF 
LIVING THAT IS MORE CONSISTENT WITH THE GENERAL 
WELFARE. 

When the United States Congress was considering war prohibition there 
was opposition, not only from the American liquor traffic and all the 
banks and other concerns that become inevitably bound in the bundle of life 
with any legalized wrong, but also from foreign liquor interests, especially 
the French Wine and Brandy Interest, whose hidden hand achieved favors 


58 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


in the first war prohibition legislation passed by Congress, as it long prev¬ 
iously held back the hand of the Czar from signing a prohibition law for 
Finland. The world should demand that France rid herself and the world 
of that Brandy and Wine Trust, that assumes to be a world Kaiser for sup¬ 
pressing the “ self determination of people ’’ on the liquor issue. 

International Arguments For Prohibition. 

If there were time I would like to make a world tour in thought to draw 
from every nation its best argument for total abstinence and prohibition. 
Britain’s best would be its temperance insurance system, originated by 
Robert Warner in 1844, which has proved incontrovertably that even such 
very moderate drinking as does not bar one from life insurance shortens 
life from 26 to 27 per cent. The best contribution of France is the official 
poster on alcoholism in which the Republic says officially under the great 
mottoes, Liberty, Equality, Fraternity,” that the habitual use of wine, beer 
or spirits to an extent that does not produce drunkenness does produce alco¬ 
holism, that is, the chronic poisoning of the white cells in the blood, “ the 
little white bodyguard,” that makes them incapable of defending the body 
against the invading horde of microbes that bring most of the diseases. 

Japan contributes the story of an invincible army freer from “ wine and 
women ” than any army since Cromwell’s, showing what way efficiency and 
victory lie in war and peace alike. China, learning from Japan’s triumph over 
Russia, which the Chinese saw could not have been accomplished if Japan 
had not prohibited opium, undertook and carried through in the face of great 
obstacles, opium prohibition, with the slogan that united all China as that 
individualistic and provincial people were never united before: 

“ That China May Be Strong.” 

Where can statesmen find a better slogan for the coming peace contest 
of nations for their relative share in the world’s markets in the new era when 
the victory will be decided by efficienc}^ and not by force. Translated for 
universal adoption this slogan would*read: 

That our country may be strong, 

We will put down every wrong. 

Asia’s great contribution to the argument is the prohibitions of the great 
religions, Hinduism, Buddhism, Mohammedism, Judaism and Christianity, 
whose adherents include a majority of the civilized people of the world. The 
Bible’s prohibitions are stronger and broader than those of any other re¬ 
ligion: Abstain from every form of evil.” Woe unto him that giveth his 
neighbor drink.” 

I should like to add from every nation, as quotations from the oldest 
testament of natural law, the discoveries of its greatest scientists as to the 
harmfulness to body and brain, to parenthood and industry, of even the mod¬ 
erate use of the mildest intoxicants. 

I noted in my tours of Europe before the war, and especially in the meet¬ 
ings of the International Congress on Alcoholism and other European tem¬ 
perance conventions, that the medical leaders and university professors and 
public officials abroad were more publicly and actively identified with cam¬ 
paigns against alcoholism than the same groups in the United States. And 
more help for prohibition has come from labor leaders in Europe than from 
labor leaders in the United States. European socialists know and say that 


WHY INTERNATIONAIv PROHIBITION? 


59 


drunken and half drunken men are too content with low conditions to make 
a good fight for social betterment. 

In London, in 1909, at the International Congress on Alcoholism, where 
hundreds of Europe^s scholarly men were gathered, there was no enthusiasm 
for schemes of regulation and restriction by license or government ownership 
or disinterested management. Those tempearnce experts knew well from 
sincere efforts to use such methods, their ineffectiveness. But when black 
and white maps were displayed showing the rising, spreading tide of prohibi¬ 
tion in the United States, the whole audience burst into applause whose 
intensity proclaimed at once the failure of the petty restrictions Europe had 
vainly tried, and the great hope that the United States would give prohibition 
to the whole world. 

Why is it that Europe with more lodges meeting regularly to study the 
liquor problem, and especially more Bands of Hope regularly training its 
children, and far more influential support from its universities for abstinence, 
has had so little prohibition? 

This is, perhaps, a part of the answer: Nothing gets prohibition arguments 
before the people anywhere so effectively as a campaign to elect a law or to 
elect men pledged to pass one. American population includes all Europe in 
miniature, and a campaign of speeches in public halls and on the street, as well 
as in the churches, persuades a majority of the people—sometimes after many 
years of such educative campaigns—that the law would be a benefit, and the 
minority is so far persuaded that they are at least ready to submit to the judg¬ 
ment of the majority. WHAT EUROPE NEEDS IS REFERENDUMS 
EVERYWHERE ON PROHIBITION FOR LOCAL OR LARGER AREAS 
THAT THE FACTS ITS LEADERS HAVE PROVED AGAINST 
ALCOHOL MAY BECOME KNOWN AND FELT BY PUBLIC DISCUS¬ 
SION, WITH A CONTEST TO BE WON TO ROUSE A FIGHTING 
INTEREST. 

Sweden's National Prohibition In General Strike. 

A conclusive argument for national prohibition in every belligerent 
country during demobilization and industrial reconstruction, is found in the 
wonderful effects of temporary national prohibition in Sweden during the 
general strike in 1909. About a quarter of a million workmen, in a nation 
whose population was about that of New York City, five millions, were to 
go on strike. The leaders of the workmen joined with civil officials in asking 
for the closing of bar rooms all over the land that the strike might not be 
defeated by violence that would give occasion for the government to inter¬ 
vene; also that workmen might neither waste the money nor befuddle the 
brains needed in a great battle with capital. Here are the statistics, given 
Dr. R. Hercod, of the International Temperance Bureau, Lausanne, showing 
that August, 1909, with a strike on, but without saloons, was far more 
orderly than the previous August when bar rooms were open, with no excite¬ 
ment. 

Arrests For Drunkenness. 

Saloons open Saloons closed 


Place. August o8. August og 

Gothenburg . 847 113 

Stockholm .I >549 169 

Nyloping . 26 i 

Orebro . 84 o 






60 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


In Gothenburg from Sept, to Sept., 1908, with the open liquor shop, there 
were 188 arrests. From Sept. 1st to 7th, 1909, with no public sale of 
liquor, there were only three arrests. On Sept. 8, bar rooms were opened 
again, and from Sept. 8 to 19, inclusive, there were 259 arrests. 

In August, a meeting of 20,000 strikers near Stockholm, called by the 
central strike committee, passed the following resolutions: 

The war of the giants that the Swedish workmen are now carrying on, 
is an historical event that will exercise a profound influence upon the de¬ 
velopment of our country. 

“ The eyes of all the world are directed upon the workers of Sweden 
whose coolness and calm have excited the wonder and admiration of every 
country. The immediate and important results of the provisional prohibition 
of alcohol, though incomplete, have astonished the world. There are no ar¬ 
rests for drunkenness; the accidents and crimes that are the consequences 
of drinking have disappeared. The coffers of the saloon-keepers, for the 
most part filled by the wages of the poor workmen, are empty. The places 
for the sale of whiskey and beer are shut, notwithstanding that the working 
class has gathered its battalions to defend its hearths and its country, and 
perpare for the generations to come an era of justice and political equality. 

Shall such a satisfactory state of things disappear? Shall the workmen 
of Sweden allow, without protest, alcoholic capital to stretch out its arms 
over the thousands of workers? Will they allow each year thousands of 
men and women to be sacrificed on the altar of alcoholic capital ? Will they 
permit the liquor money power to rob the working class of a hundred million 
crowns every year? Will they suffer the prisons and hospitals to be filled 
for the most part with victims of alcohol and poverty, and political and 
social impotence? 

“ Is it not proper that in these days of the strike that the people of 
Sweden should assemble in battle and declare that they will not tolerate 
the traffic whose principal object is to ruin the working class? Perhaps 
our declaration may not be followed by any immediate effect, but the resolute 
attitude of the entire working class on this question will be a re-echoing 
protest whose influence will be limited only by its educating effect. 

‘‘ The people of Finland, with the exception of the ruling class, and of 
Iceland, and of ten American States (28 in 1918), have branded the traffic 
in alcohol as a trade detrimental to society. 

“ It is a glorious task for the workmen of Sweden to place themselves 
at the head of this movement for freedom. They are writing at this historic 
hour, one of the most glorious pages in their history and in that of the 
Swedish people and the generation which shall follow us shall bless their 
memory. 

Comrades, cease from useless discussion about moderation and abstin¬ 
ence. Let us set ourselves to our great task of intellectual and economic 
freedom. It is the effectual, permanent prohibition of alcohol that will attain 
this. Forward, then, in all the communes of Sweden.” 

From the date of that Swedish demonstration of the value of national 
prohibition, the organized workmen of that country have been the prohibition 
leaders of Europe. They carried prohibition in their lower house of Parlia¬ 
ment, but the aristocratic upper house (down to 1918) has been willing to 
yield nothing but ‘‘ restrictions,” such as Americans have found to be a 
mockery. 


WHY INTERNATIONAL PROHIBITION? 


61 


Let Swedish prohibitionists strike one more while the war sets the 

EVILS OF DRINK IN THE WORST LIGHT. 

Keeping in mind the new industrial era that peace will bring to the 
whole world, we should ponder deeply as another Swedish contribution to 
the arguments for national and international prohibition the following pro¬ 
found utterance of the Crown Prince of Sweden, in opening a Good Templar 
festival at Hessleholm in 1911: 

'' The temperance movement is one of the greatest of our time, a move¬ 
ment by which the people will gain self-reliance and self-control. The final 
aim is nothing less than the most complete possible liberation of our people 
from the destructive effects of the use of alcohol. There are, of course, dif¬ 
ferences of opinion as to the best ways of attaining this end. But that that 
end can and must be reached is the principal point upon which all are united. 

“ In our time the struggle for existence goes on among the people with 
increasing sharpness because general development is progressing with re¬ 
markable and increasing swiftness. It is of great importance to the State 
as well as to the individual to use the utmost exertion not to be left helpless 
in the rear and perhaps to be finally overcome by a more vigorous people 
or community. I believe that this sharp, but at the same time stimulating 
struggle, promoting as it does, the physical, moral and mental powers, facil¬ 
itates greater productiveness in the muscle and nerve-taxing work of our 
modern times. These powers render possible the best quality and quantity 
of labor. But what is of yet greater significance, this physical and mental 
strength is transmitted in a probably increasing degree from generation to 
generation. 

“ All of this will so obviously strengthen the competitive power of a people 
in the world’s markets that I do not hesitate to make this assertion: That nation 

WHICH IS THE FIRST TO FREE ITSELF FROM THE INJURIOUS EFFECTS OF ALCOHOL 
WILL THEREBY ATTAIN A MARKED ADVANTAGE OVER OTHER NATIONS IN THE 
AMICABLE YET INTENSIVE STRUGGLE FOR EXISTENCE. I hope that OUr COUntry will 
be the one which will first understand and secure this advantage.” 

The Dominion of Canada, which has long had the lowest per capita 
consumption of alcohol of any Commonwealth of such an extent, will soon 
give us results of the first long test of a prohibition broad enough to be called 
national. The Premier, Sir Richard Borden, confidently expects beneficent 
national results because of the success of the provincial prohibition that pre¬ 
ceded and prepared for national, as may be seen in the following telegram 
sent in response to inquiry, to Bishop of Kalgoorlie, West Australia, (pub¬ 
lished Toronto Pioneer, Aug. 2, 1918) : 

“ Prohibition of the sale of alcoholic liquors as a provincial measure 

HAS BEEN IN FORCE IN EIGHT OUT OF NINE PROVINCES SUFFICIENTLY LONG TO 
REALIZE AND CONFIRM THE EXPECTATION OF GREAT BENEFITS-MORAL, COM¬ 

MERCIAL, AND INDUSTRIAL—CONSEQUENT ON ITS ENFORCEMENT.” 

The White Cyclone of World-Wide Prohibition. 

The experiments and experience, that show liquor restriction of every 
form has failed; that prohibition of every form has helped; and the fact that 
commonwealth after commonwealth is adopting the prohibition policy, with 
no backsets in the 20th century except in upset Russia, give us the ARGU¬ 
MENT OF MANIFEST DESTINY. 

Even a liquor seller and his political friends ought to be able to see that 
prohibition, right or wrong, is coming, and take to the cyclone cellar pointed 


62 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


out by the Catholic Plenary Council of Baltimore, when it urged Catholics 
in the liquor business “ to find a more honorable way to make their living.” 
In these days when war makes a shortage of labor, it is a favorable time 
for all in the liquor business to do that. 

When I was making ten speeches for war prohibition on a Sunday in Pitts¬ 
burgh, I entered a church shortly before the pastor had ended his sermon, to be 
ready to speak at its close. I had in my hand a black roll about eight feet long and 
as large around as a gas pipe. About that time German spies were blowing up 
buildings in cities where munitions for the Allies were being made, and so a 
church officer sitting two pews back of where I sat, whispered to his wife: “ That 
looks suspicious; if that fellow moves Pll have him by the throat.” That promises 
a new chapter of movie thrills, such as “ The Perils of Pauline.” But I skinned 
my dynamite before I rose, and behold, it was white. And the church officer 
had never seen white dynamite, and so I went forward unmolested. It was 
dynamite, moral dynamite, to blow up the supreme foe of all lands—a world-map 
three-fourths white through prohibition by governments and religions. Russia’s 
great prohibition for more than half of Europe and more than half of Asia 
had turned the majority of the world to prohibition as by a two-thirds vote. 
There are many qualifications of the map and explanations for which we have 
here no space, but the eve gets the right impression — PROHIBITION IS 
MANIFEST DESTINY—A WHITE CYCLONE THAT WILL ERE LONG 
SWEEP EVERY BAR ROOM OFF THE EARTH, AND GIVE US A 
SALOONLESS WORLD. 

A commercial traveller from New York was caught in a western cyclone 
and swept a block in the debris of a wrecked building, but miraculously escaped. 
A home friend to whom he told his thrilling experience, exclaimed, sympa¬ 
thetically, “ Can’t something be done to stop these cyclones ? ” The traveller, 
who had been there, dryly remarked: “No, I think the best way is just to go 
right along with them.” 

Even liquor men might as well “ go right along with ” the purifying 
white cyclone of prohibition that God is driving across the world. 

Appeal to British and French Prohibitionists. 

Let the brave minority of prohibitionists in France and England take 
a note out of war strategy, and while we fight on the Washington front keep 
our enemies busy on the London and Paris fronts. 

Prohibition may be more difficult when the war is over because of the 
soldier’s desire to indulge after hardship, and because of the reconstruction 
problems that may absorb legislators even more than they are now engaged 
in the less intricate problem of war. 

Let us jump while the wave is on the swell, when prohibition seems to 
be the tide in the affairs of men that can be taken at the flood. 

P. S.— Latest French and British Arguments for Prohibition. 

Union Signal of Aug. i- 8 , 1918 , quotes from French paper, L’Abstinence, an 
abstract from an address by G. de Jaer at a meeting of French civil engineers 
from which we cull following: 

In the pre-war period France was not only producing great quantities of 
wine but was importing fully twice as much as she exported. Under these cir¬ 
cumstances, said M. de Jaer, wine is not a source of material net wealth, and 
as it supplies a purely fictitious need, it in no wise contributes to the wealth of 
the country. 


WHY INTERNATIONAL PROHIBITION? 


63 



But so far from abolishing the production of fruits now made into wine, he 
would turn the industry into really useful channels of production by adopting 
methods already successfully employed in Italy, Austria, Greece, Switzerland and 
Germany, which, he said, produce unfermented beverages of good quality that 
will keep and stand transportation. 

Further, by applying to the apple and the grape the system of extracting 
their sweet juices used with the sugar beet, the manufacture of brandy from the 
pulp would be stopped as there would not be enough juice left to make distillation 
profitable, but the pulp could be made into excellent cattle feed. 

M. de Jaer followed his suggestions with some cogent reasons why France 
must adopt new methods: “French wine culture will be ruined,” he declared, 
“ if the methods of using the grape are not changed.” Viticulture is developing 
all over the world. The number of abstainers is rapidly increasing; in the United 
vStates, Canada, and the Scandinavian countries they increase daily, and soon in 
these great countries they will no longer use anything but the unfermented 
grape-juice. 

The production of wine is even exceeding the requirements of France 
herself. 

“ Is the number of drinkers going to increase in the same proportion? ” asks 
M. de Jaer. “ Certainly not,” he answers, “ as the French population is diminish¬ 
ing. Where then does the increased production go ? Into the stomachs of those 
who drink two, three, four, and even ten litres a day. The prosperity of vine 
culture at present rests with this kind of drinkers, as is easily proved.” The 
votes of the Academy of Medicine in January, 1916 , showed that of forty-four 
members voting, eleven voted that an average of one litre a day might be per¬ 
missible, thirty-three voted for less than a litre, eleven of the thirty-three voting 
against any use of wine at all. 










64 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


The maximum number of wine-drinkers in France, said M. de Jaer, has been 
placed at ten million. At an average of three-quarters of a litre a day this 
would amount to 270 litres each per year, a total of 27 million hectolitres or 33 
million less than the production, to say nothing of the importation. " This 

EXCESS CONSEQUENTLY MUST BE USED BY THE INTEMPERATE DRINKERS WHOSE 
CHILDREN IN THE ECONOMIC STRUGGLE AFTER THE WAR WILL HAVE TO COMPETE 

FOR France with children of sober parents of the United States and 

OTHER countries WHERE TEMPERANCE IS NOT AN OBJECT OF MOCKERY.” 

These are facts, declared M. de Jaer, that must be faced courageously and 
spoken frankly. Change the use of the vine and it will not be merely 60 million 
hectolitres that will be required, but 100 million. This way, he maintained, lies 
future prosperity for France and its vinegrowers. 

Mr. Philip W. Wilson, Special Correspondent of the London Daily News, 
writing from New York of the rapid growth of abstinence and prohibition in the 
United States (we quote from Clip Sheet of Methodist Board of Temperance of 
Aug. 17, 1918) says: “ The question for the old world to decide is whether 

SHE WILL HAVE ANY CHANCE ECONOMICALLY AGAINST THE NEW WORLD IF, TO 
MILITARY AND NAVAL HANDICAPS, SHE ADDS THE BURDEN OF INTEMPERANCE FROM 
WHICH SOCIETY HERE IS SHAKING ITSELF FREE.” 


In New York Times Current History Magazine, Winifred Stevens, writing 
on “Reconstructing the Life of France,” says: “All agree that something must 
be done to rival the attractions of the tavern (where the peasant is too prone to 
find his only relaxation) and to continue and supplement the teaching' of the 
school.” It is proposed to establish in each village—by the State if possible— 
centres of culture and amusement, but it will be found that these will no more 
counteract the drink shops in France than libraries and playgrounds do in the 
United States in license cities. Only by closing the drink shops can their evil 
work be stopped. Let these be drink shop substitutes to go with prohibition. 
No addict of opium or alcohol is likely to forego it because there are amusemnts 
across the way. He will take both. 

International prohibition should include all intoxicants, not liquid ones only 
but opium, cocaine, hashish, as suggested by ex-Senator Henry A. Blair when 
President of the International Reform Bureau, in a keynote for the 20th Century. 


The TEMPERANCE MOVEMENT SHOULD INCLUDE ALL DRUGS AS WELL AS 
DRINKS THAT CREATE A DEPRA^^E:D APPETITE, AND THE GOAL SHOULD BE 
INTERNATIONAL. 







WHY ‘ BONE DRY ’ STATE CONSTITUTIONAL PROHIBITION? ” 65 


“Why ‘Bone Dry’ State Constitutional Prohibition?” 

The Caucasian characteristically assumes that he invented prohibition. He 
does not prove it: he admits it. Which suggests a new application of the old ' 
story of the American boy who was asked by his Sunday school leacher, “ Who 
was the first man?” To which he promptly replied, “George Washington; 
first in war, first in peace ”—The teacher interrupted him to say that Adam was 
the first man; at which he sniffed, “Well, if you are talking about foreigners, I 
suppose he was.” If we do not ignore “foreigners” in our history, we shall 
have to admit that the supremely important invention of prohibition came to us, 
as did our Christian civilization, from Asia. 

It is not flattering to our Caucasian pride to contrast the wisdom and 
efficiency of India and Arabia, which promptly stamped out drunkenness, cen¬ 
turies ago, on its first strong manifestation, with the shilly-shallying 6n this issue 
in old England and New England. 

Effective Prohibition in Asia. 

When drunkenness was seen to be a social peril in India, and later in 
Arabia, the leaders of religion and the leaders of Government, with clear vision, 
undimmed by covetousness, said together: “ The way to stop it is to stop it. 
In the name of religion, stop drinking; in the name of government, stop selling.” 
And they stopped it, leaving no drug stores in the rear, no cracks in the dyke 
for “ personal use ”; no gallon or quart a month indulgences. 

The result was that in the course of a few generations the sale and use of 
intoxicating liquors almost disappeared in Asia. And since the white man came, 
with his drinking example and his efforts to break down the native abstinence for 
personal profit and public revenue, only a few thousand of these abstaining 
Hindus, Buddhists and Mohammedans have been lured from the supreme virtue 
of their religions. 

Those who seek to apologize for the liquor traffic or the liquor habit are 
wont to say, dogmatically: “ There is in the human race an inherent craving for 
stimulants, and they will be used in one form if not another.” 

/ have five hundred and fifty-five millions of answers to that fallacy: and I 
am going to give them to you. 

That is approximately the number of people who have for generations 
observed the prohibitory laws of the great religions of Asia—that of Mohammed, 
given in the seventh century A. D.; that of Buddha given in the fifth century 
B. C.; and the still earlier prohibitory law of the Hindus, which probably origi¬ 
nated as far back as the days of Solomon. 

And the name of Solomon reminds us that the religion of the Bible, properly 
understood, is also a prohibition religion. It was Solomon, a Hebrew; king, who 
said, '' Look not thou upon the wine when it is red ” —a straight prohibition. 

Some people in our day who abstain themselves, serve liquors to their 
guests Several of our Presidents have gotten as far as Solomon, but not as far 
as Habakkuk, who said, “ Woe unto him that giveth his neighbor drink.” 

That too, is a clear-cut prohibition. When a man is fully convinced that 
liquor is harm’ful, and so never drinks, but gives it, nevertheless, to his guests, we 
recall the woman who said in prayer meeting, “ I found my jewelry was dragging 
my soul down to hell, and so I gave it to my sister.” 


66 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


That Christianity is a total abstinence religion conies out with unmistakable 
clearness in Paul’s command, as correctly translated in the Revision, “ABSTAIN 
FROM EVERY FORM OF EVIL.” If that which Gladstone said “ has done 
more harm than war, pestilence and famine,” is not a “ form of evil,” there is 
no evil. If it is a “ form of evil,” we are divinely prohibited from participating 
in it in any way, by drinking or selling or authorizing the sale. 

Anglo-Saxon Blundering on Booze. 

In contrast with this wisdom of Asia in dealing with the liquor traffic, let 
us now turn with shamefacedness to our Anglo-Saxon fathers’ thousand years 
of blundering. 

In far off centuries, drunkenness became alarming in Great Britain. The 
leaders, instead of adopting total abstinence or prohibition or both, said, “ We 
will get the preachers to preach moderation. Such .preaching had no more 
effect upon the increasing intemperance than the shouting of children on the 
beach has on the incoming tide. 

Then they pledged the people not to drink, except on holidays, and at wed¬ 
dings and funerals, and dedications of churches and ordinations of preachers. 
They might as well have tried to hold back the inflowing ocean tide by telling 
children to drive a row of stakes just above the waves at ebb tide. 

Then some one conceived the idea that they might restrict the traffic by 
taxing it, and at the same time make public revenue out of it. The acquisitive 
Anglo-Saxon must have fairly smacked his lips at that supposed discovery. To 
any one of clear vision it would have been apparent that revenue and restriction 
are like horses whose heads point in opposite directions, and so can not pull 
forward in the same team. Those low license laws had no more effect on the 
rising tide of intemperance than low forts of sand built by childish hands on 
the beach have on the inflowing sea. 

Then they said, “We will put a “ high license ” on the drink.” This was 
no more effective than the higher mounds of sand built by the same childish 
hands have on the rising tide. 

Then they said, we must put the traffic into the hands of men “ of good 
moral character ”—refusing to see that the evil is not in the “ character ” of the 
maker or seller but in the nature of the alcohol. When elders manufactured 
rum and deacons served it, it did the devil's work just the sarnie as before. The 
church officers became so drunken that the traffic was put into the hands of the 
preachers; and they, too, became drunkards. 

Then they tried government ownership. When I think of government 
ownership I think of King Canute, the Dane, who,—perhaps to rebuke his flat¬ 
tering courtiers, who treated him as almost a god, ordered his throne placed on 
the beach at low tide, and with his scepter drew a line in the sand, and dra¬ 
matically cried to the tide: “ Thus far shalt thou go, and no farther.” The 
dashing surf seemed to laugh at the assumption that a human king might control 
it, and rolled in until the king had to run for his life, with his courtiers dragging 
his throne chair after him. That might properly be used as a cartoon to show 
the ineffectiveness of government ownership, alike in Norway and in South 
Carolina. 

Then good men wasted time and money in experiments of “ disinterested 
management,” which are usually not so very disinterested,, for four per cent of 
sure revenue is commonly received by those who provide the funds for this scheme. 

“ Disinterested management ” came to its reductio ad ahsurdum in the United 
States in the Subway Saloon, bought and managed by a company of wine drink- 


WHY ‘BONE DRY’ STATE CONSTITUTIONAE PROHIBITION? 


67 


ing churchmen, who thought they would prevent the drink from harming the 
poor man hy having it piously sold. The place was opened with prayer by a 
bishop, and the Doxolo^, which was perhaps adapted to the occasion—“ Praise 
God, from whom all whiskey flows.” After two years the experiment was given 
up as a flat failure, and the old barkeeper admitted he “ could mix everything hut 
rum and religion.” 

A Harvard professor, according to a press report, experimenting with the 
intelligence of a worm, has discovered that the wriggling invertebrate knows 
enough, after three trials, to avoid a path that leads to an electric shock, and to 
take the road that leads to comfort.” Our Anglo-Saxon fathers seem to have 
had less sense than the worm in their experiments with alcohol. Prolonged 
experiments with the knock out drops, with disastrous results in each case, 
preceded their final conviction that moderation and license were fatal paths, and 
they must go the other way. In education and civil liberty and philanthropy the 
British Empire and the United States have led the modern world, and they have 
looked down on Asia only a little less than upon Africa; but Asia has not only 
given Europe a nobler religion than its own, but a better plan for suppression of 
the greatest moral and social evil. When I read the pitiful story of our fathers’ 
persistent efforts for a thousand years to do what should have been seen at once 
to be impossible, namely, to feed our appetites with alcoholic fuddle, and our 
private and public treasuries with revenue and profit, and at the same time 
restrict to its lowest terms the drink evil, it makes me think of what the boy 
said who had studied the life of Solomon and his thousand wives and frankly 
declared, '' He was the greatest fool for a wise man I ever saw.” 


Prohibition Introduced and Defined. 


The complete failure of the restriction and revenue copartnership, through 
which philanthropists persistently endeavored, for centuries, to reduce the drink 
evil to the minimum, cleared the way for experiments with the various forms of 
prohibition, which had begun before the license system’s failure wa^ generally 
admitted. 

Prohibition does not define accomplishment, but only the aim and attitude of 
government toward wrong. License is a purchased truce—sometimes ^ sur¬ 
render; Prohibition is a declaration of war. License is an edict of toleration— 
sometimes a certificate of “ good moral character;” Prohibition is a proclamation 
of outlawry. As murder, adultery, theft, false witness and political corruption 
are outlawed, the ringleader of this “gang” ought also to be outlawed. The 
first requisite of law is justice. A law that sanctions wrong is not law at all 
but legislative crime. It is not “ public sentiment ” but public conscience out of 
which law should be quarried. Law is an educator. Duelling and smuggling 
and liquor-selling were once in the “ best society.” Gradually the law has made 
them disreputable. Rumselling under prohibition is a sneaking fugitive, like 
counterfeiting—not dead but disgraced, and so shorn of power. ^ ^ ^ 

The argument for Prohibition may be concisely stated in four propositions, 
the four strands of the halter with which the rum traffic is to be hung 7 

I. The business interests of our country demand the suppression of their 


vorst foe—the bar-room. . 

2. The homes of our country demand the suppression of their worst foe-^ 

fie bar-room.. . j j • r 

3. The political liberty of our country demands the suppression of the 

vorse foe of clean politics—the bar-room. 


68 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


4. The conscience of the country demands that the attitude of Government 
toward this foe of business, home and liberty, as toward other foes of the 
public good, shall be one of uncompromising hostility, regardless of the degree 
to which the evil can be destroyed. We do not legalize prostitution and gam¬ 
bling, save in backward commonwealths, even when it is admitted they are not 
likely to be wholly suppressed. The first business of law is to outlaw wrong, to 
label it, as an educative warning. 

Prohibition History in Brief. 

The experiments, for about three score years and ten, with various forms of 
prohibition—local, state and national—have proved them to be, respectively, good, 
better, best. 

While all plans of liquor “ restriction have failed to materially reduce 
the “ evils of drink, after full and fair trial, prohibition, after trials shorter 
and less fair, has proved reasonably effective—as much so as other laws 
intended to restrain evils entrenched in the greed and passions of men—laws 
which must be administered by political agencies. ^ 

The history of prohibition may be roughly divided as follows 

I. First Era of State Prohibition, 1851-1856. ^ 

II. Era of Many Repeals of State Prohibition, 1856-1870. 

III. Era of Town and County Prohibition, 1870-1907. 

IV. Rennaissance of State Prohibition, 1907-1917. 
y. National Prohibition (begun in Russia), 1914— 

VI. “Bone Dry” Era (begun in U. S.), 1917— 

VII. International Prohibition, (?). 

There is no time in this brief survey for retail proof of the reasonable 
success of “ the Maine Law,” the original State prohibition. We have 
wholesale proof in the fact that fourteen other States followed Mainfe. 

Every Northern State, except New Jersey, voted to abolish the bar room 
in those first five years of prohibition history, 1851-1856; and New Jersey had 
then its first lucid interval of local option—the only one previous to 1918. 

That all these States save Maine, Kansas and North Dakota, relapsed 
before 1907, was due primarily to absorption of the nation in the Civil War, 
which should warn us not to allow ourselves to he drawn again by war from fight¬ 
ing what leaders of all nations in this war have declared to he the supreme foe. 

Prohibitionists of 1856 and after turned their energies to abolition of slavery, 
but liquor dealers kept up their own selfish fight. They treasonably took ad¬ 
vantage of the nation’s peril, persistently broke the new prohibition laws, and 
then urged their lawlessness as a reason why they should be legalized. They 
whined then, as in 1917-18, that ''divisive issues should he dropped in order to 
assure unity in winning the war.” And so the foe in the rear successfully de¬ 
fended the slavery of drink, that held more millions under its spell than were 
delivered from negro slavery. 

There was another reason for those repeals which should be recalled for 
instruction. In that first era of prohibition, as since, many good people expected, 
childishly, that prohibition, alone of all laws to repress popular evils, would 
instantly annihilate what it forbade. If any one was arrested for drunkenness 
in a prohibition State, that was evidence that "prohibition don't prohibit.” If 
some mayor or chief of^ police or sheriff proved himself a failure, many childish 
citizens accepted the liquor men's argument that the law should be changed, 


“ WHY ‘ BONE DRY ’ STATE CONSTITUTIONAL PROHIBITION? ” 69 

when manifestly the change required was in the officers'! Many people, ap¬ 
parently sane, assumed the law was a magic axe that would cut down the drink 
evil even though people put it into the wrong hands. 

The saying of the wicked, “ good people are easily fooled,” having been 
verified by the general repeal of state prohibition, many good citizens adopted 
the local option theory (to be shown at its best in the next chapter), that if a 
majority of the people of a town should vote “ No license,” the local officials, 
even though not elected on that issue, would bow to this proof that local “ public 
sentiment ” demands the suppression of the saloon. In fact, local prohibition 
ordinances were no better enforced than State laws, and were much more handi¬ 
capped because drink was legally sold in the next town. 

Another difficulty in the local option plan is that liquor men will never 
allow a no-license election to he a local fight. On their side it is always national. 
Local option requires Yorktown alone to fight Cornwallis. Another disadvantage 
of local prohibition is that when a town has driven saloons from its own doors, 
some of its people think the prohibition fight ended so far as they are con¬ 
cerned. “ Let everybody clean up his own town, and the devil take the hind¬ 
most.” 

Nevertheless the closing of saloons in ever so small an area, even with 
poor enforcement—prohibition in a circle of fire, with an unfriendly fire com¬ 
pany on guard—has always reduced crime and vice, as a thousand statistical 
contrasts of towns “ before ” and “ after ” have shown. 

The general return to State prohibition in 1907 and since, has been due 
less to the temperance forces than to the liquor forces. The business men in 
most places would have been content to fight it out, town by town if the liquor 
men had fought fair—local liquor men against local prohibitionists, with a good 
sport’s acceptance of the issue. But, in treasonable disregard of the funda¬ 
mental principle of democracy, majority rule, the liquor interests, entrenched 
in the big county seat, broke down the law in the rural parts of the county. 

Then citizens said. We must vote hy' coimties. But when the good citizens 
of a county, by a fair vote, ordered the saloons out, liquor dealers invaded the 
whole county as secretly as German spies, from the State metropolis. When¬ 
ever and wherever prohibition won in a fair fight, the liquor interests sys¬ 
tematically and persistently tempted citizens by speak-easies and advertisements 
to purchase liquors, and bought their way to political power to use it for their own 
business ends rather than the public good. Thus the liquor men drove license 

MEN AND LOCAL OPTION MEN TO StATE PROHIBITION. 

The last straw was the liquor men’s “ wake ” at Cartersville, Georgia, over 
the burial of their arch foe, Sam Jones. “ Now we will come back to Carters¬ 
ville,” they said. That assumption that there was no saloon fighters left, roused 
the South, and State after State, already more than half “ dry ” by local option, 
adopted State-wide prohibition. 

State Prohibition Since 1907 Holds, and Entrenches in the Constitution. 

The new start in State prohibition, in 1907, in ten years added 25 dry States 
to the three previously on the dry side—not one State in that period having 
gone backward except Alabama, which relapsed for one year only, to return 

^°THIS IS THE SUPREME, EXPERIMENTAL ARGUMENT FOR 
STATE PROHIBITION—A WHOLESALE PROOF, WITHOUT RETAIL 


70 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


STATISTICS! PROHIBITION, THOUGH IMPERFECT, WORKS SO 
WELL THAT THE MOVEMENTS IN TFIE STATES ARE NOW ALL 
FORWARD—NONE OF THEM BACKWARD TO LICENSE. 

Another tremendous wholesale argument for prohibition is, that the big 
cities that vote “ wet ’’ when a State goes ‘‘ dry,’’ and have to be coerced, vote 
“ dry ” when a new referendum is made a year later, even when the proposal 
is only to make an exception for beer. This was the case in Seattle, Spokane 
and Denver. 

Experience shows defects of State statutory prohibition in that 

EACH LEGISLATURE MAY BE SECRETLY PACKED TO REPEAL PROHIBITION. ThAT 
KEEPS THE LIQUOR MAN, FAR AND NEAR IN StATE POLITICS, FOR MCHICH REASON 

THE States that try statutory prohibition usually proceed lo put it into 
THE Constitution, the people’s law, where only the people themselves 

CAN CHANGE IT. ThAT, IN A NUTSHELL, IS THE ARGUMENT FOR MAKING StATE 
PROHIBITION CONSTITUTIONAL. 

FOR MANY MINDS THE ONLY ARGUMENTS NEEDED FOR 
STATE-WIDE PROHIBITION ARE: THE EVER-INCREASING EF¬ 
FORTS OF LIQUOR DEALERS TO DEFEAT IT, AND ITS EVER-IN¬ 
CREASING SPREAD, NEVERTHELESS. 

But for the sake of any doubter who is not so'convinced we will present 
some facts from prohibition States, chiefly those that have adopted it recently 
because it is the purpose of this brief not to reprint to any considerable extent 
facts already accessible in books, but rather to supplement previous publications 
with latest statistics and testimonies. 

The supreme argument, both in war and peace, for state-wide as well as 
nation-wide prohibition, is the patriotic argument, '^Eat prohibition saves na¬ 
tional resources, especially man-power; and the next highest argument is. that 
prohibition is home protection; but closely related to that, since most men lare 
desirous of good wages and business success chiefly for the sake of wife and 
children, is the argument that prohibition spells prosperity both for workmen 
and their employers. ^ ^ ^ 

Union Labor’s Tribute to Prohibition. 

The economic benefits of statewide prohibition are conclusively proved in 
the following representative testimonials from leaders of organized labor in dry 
States, gathered and published by Ohio Dry Federation in July, 1917: ^ 

John L. Donnelly, President Arizona State Federation of Labor: “Arizona workers 
are certainly better morally and financially than they were before prohibition was 
adopted.” 

Bert Davis, First Vice President same: “During the campaign to make Arizona 
dry, I opposed prohibition because it meant the abolishment of an industry without 
providing other work for those who would be thrown out of work. I have since 
come to the conclusion that my fears were at least partly unfounded. The condition 
of the workers in Arizona is a great deal better than it was before the State went dry. 
The workers who were in the liquor industry, were largely absorbed by other industries. 
If I were in the same campaign again I would work and vote for a dry amendment. 
Workers who formerly spent their money for their own undoing, now spend it for 
themselves and their families. As far as the rights of the individual are concerned, I 
consider his rights very small when compared with the rights of a community.” 

Ernest Beckman, Business Agent, Deputy Organizer, A. F. of L, No. 220 Carpenters 
and Joiners of America, Wallace, Idaho: “Ten years ago this town boasted 37 saloons. 
If any one mentioned prohibition he was sneered and laughed at. Now, if a vote were 
taken, this district would vote dry. The workers now almost all have a bank account. 
The banks instead of saloons are crowded on Saturday night.” 





“ WHY ‘ BONE DRY ’ STATE CONSTITUTIONAE PROHIBITION? ” 71 


Leon A. Link, Secretary-Treasurer Waterloo Central Labor Union, Waterloo, 
Iowa: “At the annual convention of the Iowa State Federation of Labor, this year, I 
was surprised to find a number of the boys who used to think it would be a calamity 
if the State went dry, telling of the improved condition in their cities since the saloons 
closed.” 

_W. B. Somerville, Oregon Labor Leader: “Since the bone-dry law went into effect, 
‘a rich man’s law’ is seldom referred to. I might say that if the question of repealing 
the present law in Oregon, and going back to the saloons was left to a vote of the 
union men only, that the State would be so dry that none in 100 years would try to 
wet it up again.” 

W. F. Evans, business agent Denver (Colorado) Lodge No. 47 , International 
Association of Machinists: “In my opinion no one in Colorado was seriously harmed 
when the State went dry, while, on the other hand I know personally of cases where 
they were vastly benefited in that they, themselves, their wives and children had more 
and better food, better clothes and more of the comforts of life than before the State 
w^ent dry. I believe that all lines of business were benefited, when the State went 
dry. It took some little time for the people to adjust themselves to the new order of 
things, but I do not believe the State would go back to the old order of business, if it 
was put up to the people to decide again. I have heard people say who voted wet, 
that if it was to do over again, they would vote dry.” 

A representative fact from Colorado shows that prohibition is in the interest 
of the home—of all homes, but especially of the homes of the poor, so often 
blighted by booze. One of many lines of business that were greatly increased 
at once by prohibition in Colorado Avas that of the public laundries. Do you 
see what the flashlight shows? 

The old mother no longer must take in washing to support the family be¬ 
cause the father, affectionate when sober, can not get by the gauntlet of saloons 
with his wages. With saloons closed he brings home his money and says to 
his wife: “You don’t need to take in washing any more. Let the public laun¬ 
dries do it, and we will all go to the movies for a good time.” 

M. L. Shipman, Commissioner of Labor and Printing in North Carolina: “ Con¬ 
ditions throughout the State are a great deal better than during the period prior_ to 
the adoption of State prohibition, and we would not think for a moment of returning 
to former conditions.” 

President Lewis, United Mineworkers: “In my opinion, any attempt to_create the 
impression that beer is a part of the miner’s daily diet is an insult to the mineworkers 
of the country, a vicious reflection on their intelligence. To even insinuate that the 
miners would retaliate by reducing the production of coal if beer were stoppedi would 
be resented by the mineworkers of the country. The prohibition law in West Virginia, 
as well as other coal producing States, has done much to raise the standard of living, 
improve the life of the people and contribute to the welfare and happiness^ of the 
miners and their families. The elimination of saloons has contributed to an increase 
in coal production and the health and well-being of the miners.” 

Even in Great Britain, the belief of some statesmen that workingmen would 
revolt if prohibition were put in force to save resources needed to win the war, 
was overwhelmingly disproved by plebiscites in i6 English cities, 2 Welsh, and 
14 Scotch, all industrial centres, whose vote was for prohibition in every case, 
with a total of 197,665 to 80,953, giving a majority of 116,712. 

In 1915, the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers, usually considered the 
very highest of labor unions, endorsed both statewide and nationwide prohibition. 
The Brotherhood has always stood for abstinence, even before railroads required 
it. We all want the engineer on our train to have an eye and hand uninfluenced 
by drink. But who is there in these days of swift autos and labor shortage that 
we can afford to allow the liquor dealer to fuddle? And when the war is over 
and the labor market is over supplied, the old rule will again hold: “ The last man 
hired, and the first man fired is the man who is loaded.”^ 

Alert readers will note the many instances in which both workmen and 
business men and editors, after working hard to defeat prohibition, have been 


72 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


constrained by its favorable working to admit they were very much mistaken. 
It would be creditable to those who are now making the same blunder if they 
would quit the liquor side of this fight before they do any more of the devil’s 
work, and join the temperance Allies to win prohibition in State and Nation 
and so help to win the war. It is better to prevent than to repent. 

* See more of similar labor testimonials on p. 39 of “ Why War Prohibition? ” and note fact that peti¬ 
tions against prohibition sent to Congress were all from “ wet ” States that knew nothing of prohibition 
by experience. 


The Logical Way to Test Prohibition States. 

The Anti-Prohibition Manual of 1918 devotes pages of space representing 
months of work to tables that assume to prove that certain dry States had a 
worse record than certain wet States, on “ Savings Accounts,” “ Illiteracy,” 
“ Church Members,” “ Building and Loan Associations,” “ Paupers,” “ Insanity,” 
“ Prisoners,” “ Labor,” “ Divorces.” The figures may be correct and yet prove 
nothing. We will even add three other subjects on which they might pick out 
“ dry ” States that were not better than some “ wet ” States, namely, “ Lynch¬ 
ing,” “ Draft Rejections,” and “ Population.” Southern States are mostly dry, 
and most of the lynchings are there as most of the negroes are there. That 
also accounts for a bad record on “ Illiteracy ” in those dry States. Draft re¬ 
jections depend on many considerations. It is quite a puzzle to know why the 
only States that exceed forty per cent, in proportion of draftees rejected (Pro¬ 
vost General’s Report, Dec., 1917) are: Maine, Connecticut, Vermont and Penn¬ 
sylvania—Maine slightly less than the other three, but above the 44 States not 
named, both wet and dry. Population tends strongly to big cities, and so States 
with rural population feel the pull, and the dry States are mostly rural. Western 
States from frontier days have been less given to church going and readier to 
get divorces than people of older Eastern States, and their new prohibition has 
not yet had time to change either of those tendencies, and perhaps will not 
materially affect them. It would take a volume to explain why States differ 
on these points of comparison. 

Let any one proclaim, if he dare take the risk of being sent to the insane 
asylum, that he has figures to prove that the way to decrease illiteracy, insanity, 
divorce and crime, and increase savings accounts and loan associations and 
church members is to restore saloons to dry States. The true test of prohibi¬ 
tion States is in a critical examination of the same States before and 

AFTER PROHIBITION, AND BY THAT TEST STATE PROHIBITION MAKES A TRIUMPHANT 
SHOWING OF EVERY CASE. 

Sometimes the statistics favorable to the drys, such as increased business, 
is partly due to general conditions and tendencies in the whole country, and 
such factors should be frankly acknowledged. The benefits that must still be 
credited to prohibition are more than sufficient to prove its value. 

New Prohibition States “ Before and After Taking ” Prohibition. 

As a witness to prohibition’s benefits to the State of Washington,* 

after two and a half years’ testing, we quote from statement of Mary E. Brown, 
president of West Washington W. C. T. U., in Union Signal, July 25, 1918: 

“ Within six weeks after the law became effective collections were noticeably 
easier, sales of food and clothing increased and new savings deposit accounts were 
opened. At the end of six months it was found that children’s and women’s wear 
and the sale of high class groceries had increased twenty-five per cent to thirty per 
cent, that eating places, groceries, markets, confectionery shops and shoe stores had 

* We omit some paragraphs that are quoted on page 34 of “ Why War Prohibition? ” 



“ WHY ‘BONE DRY’ STATE CONSTITUTIONAL PROHIBITION?” 73 

multiplied, while the families of working men were better housed, better clothed, and 
better fed than in the old days when wages were divided between the home and the 
saloon. One man struck the keynote of the situation in the statement, ‘ You can’t 
tell a longshoreman from a banker now when you see him on the street.’ 

“ Seattle’s population and payroll have both increased with the great influx of 
shipbuilders, for these expert laborers have not hesitated to accept employment in a 
city where they are denied the privilege of drinking beer and wine. Instead, they 
have enthusiastically responded to the call for workmen and given such splendid service 
that Seattle has set the pace for all shipbuilding centers and is producing twenty-five 
per cent of the ships being built for the United States. Almost one-third of the ton¬ 
nage launched July 4 was built in the prohibition territory of the Northwest or, to be 
more explicit, in Astoria and Portland, Oregon, and the cities on Puget Sound. 

“ With this great increase in men and money there has been a decided decrease 
in disorderly conduct, wife desertion, and assaults. Both county and city stockades 
have largely outlived their day of usefulness as places of detention for petty of¬ 
fenders. Were it not for I. W. W. raids and bootlegger cases the police judge would 
have a pretty lonely time. 

“ Eighteen months of prohibition left the rescue houses of Seattle and other cities 
of Washington with twenty-five per cent to thirty per cent fewer unmarried mothers 
to care for than in the past and this condition continued till the war caused an 
increase in the demand for protection for these girls. 

“ In spite of war conditions and the labor shortage there was a large increase in 
attendance at the public schools last year, while the finances of the religious organi¬ 
zations have increased surprisingly. Seattle has almost forgotten the saloon as a 
part of the equipment of a city and will never allow it to return.” 

In 1914 Washington went dry by a majority of 18,632 votes. After ten 
months of prohibition the liquor men brought on a referendum election, Novem¬ 
ber 3, 1916, which proved to be their “ Armageddon,” resulting in the indorse¬ 
ment of pr-ohibition by the decisive majority of 215,036 votes. Seattle went 
wet in 1914 by 14,000 majority and dry in 1916 by 53,000. In the referendum 
election of November 3, 1916, the liquor men used all their resources and re¬ 
serves, but could only rally 48,000 votes. In 1914 “ they had no end of news¬ 
paper support, but in 1916 they had lost all of their publicity allies and had no 
editorial support.” 

Even the druggists of the State demand bone-dry prohibition. In a recent 
postal card ballot they voted to banish liquors entirely from the State, the vote 
being 385 to 156. The amendment, to be voted on next fall, banishes all in¬ 
toxicating liquors from the State. Drug stores cannot keep it. Doctors may 
administer, but cannot prescribe it. 

As to Iowa, whose statutory prohibition law went into effect in 1916, 
though the State failed in 1917 to make it constitutional prohibition, there is 
no thought of going wet, and the following statement of the general secretary 
of the Chamber of Commerce of Des Moines is representative of the general 

satisfaction: , , , , 

“There is nothing in the talk that prohibition completely demoralizes a large city. 
There must necessarily be a period of adjustment, which is oftentimes a trifle trying, 
but no disaster befalls a community if agencies in behalf of it are properly at work. 
In short, there is nothing of a serious nature in this community growing out of the 
sudden transition from open saloons to a dry town. The great thing, of course, is 
the fact that the laboring man cashes his pay check in a grocery store now instead of 

in a Journal, May i, 1918, gives the following review of 

that State’s first year under prohibition: , x • • 

“One year ago today the saloons were closed m Nebraska. Inquiry m widely 
separated communities reveals the presence of almost no opposition to the new policy. 
Almost invariably the report is of reasonable enforcement of the law, fewer police 
court cases better collections, increased bank deposits, and better social order 
o-enerallv Ti- is conceded that improved business and financial conditions may be due 
fargely to high prices and good Arops. Better social order can be charged almost 


74 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


wholly to the closing of the saloons. Thus the special public prosecutor at Omaha 
gives these as the results of the first year of prohibition in that city: 

“ A reduction of 50 per cent, in total police court arrests. 

“ Heavy reduction of number of charges of wife beating and non-support. 

“ Decrease in appeals for relief from poor debtors. 

“ Vagrancy reduced to a minimum. 

“ Omaha workhouse abandoned because not needed. 

“ County jail prisoners reduced in number 50 per cent. 

“ In Lincoln the arrests for drunkenness in the single month of September, 1916, 
were virtually the same as in the entire first year under prohibition. The number of 
criminal cases in the district court was almost cut in two. 

“ Other cities and towns have the same story to tell, the figures showing so 
striking a uniformity that it would be tiresome to repeat them. The first year has 
been so great a success for the new policy that its effect on the State is no longer 
seriously discussed.” 

Ex-Mayor Dahlman, for two years chief executive of Omaha, is quoted 
in Union Signal of July 25, 1918, as saying: “I said prohibition wouldn't work 
but it does. Em not a prohibitionist, as most every one in Nebraska knows, but 
this new law seems to be working out to the advantage of this city and its people. 
It has resulted in a decrease of the social evil; it has cut in two the number of 
cases of wife abandonment and cruelty to women. Most of the saloon property 
which was made vacant by the removal of the dramshops has been rented and 
weVe got a lot of new buildings going up. It’s surprising to any inquirer to find 
how many men who voted against and worked against the prohibition constitu¬ 
tional amendment are accepting the situation and boosting the new law now. 
We never expect to see the city ‘ wet ’ again.” 

Omaha business men,” according to a report published in the Nebraska 
State Journal, “ say that the effect of prohibition has been marked. They find 
trade better, collections prompt, and more and better goods sold. This is espe¬ 
cially evident among the small fellows, the little grocers and bakers. Many of 
these are men born in foreign lands, and heretofore strong opponents of prohibi¬ 
tion. They are for it now, after having seen its effects on their neighbors and 
their increasd purchasing power. The big employers of labor, like the packing 
houses, smelter and railroads, are a unit in saying that prohibition has greatly 
increased the effectiveness of the workers. Fewer accidents in industry are 
reported since the men have been shut "off from their ^supply of liquor.” 

As to Colorado, Ex-Mayor Speer of Denver says: I voted wet, as did 
nine-tenths of the business men of Denver, and today I would vote dry if the 
opportunity were afforded. I know personally of men who used to go to the 
saloons to spend most of their evenings. I see them today with their families at 
the picture houses. We know that business collections are better and that the 
weekly salaries of men are going home to their families instead of into the 
cash rgisters of the dram shops. We haven’t lowered the cost of government 
under the dry laws, but oiir loss of revenue from the saloon licenses has been 
made up from other sources without necessitating any increase in the tax rates.'* 

With the I St of July, 1918, South Dakota closed a year under state-wide 
prohibition. The record in Sioux Falls, the metropolis of the State, shows what 
has been accomplished during the year in the way of decrease in the number 
of arrests. For the year ending June 30, 1917, when the city was wet, there were 
1,473 arrests for all causes. The year ending June 30, 1918, without saloons, 
the total number of arrests was 118. What is true of Sioux Falls is true in 
a corresponding degree of other formerly wet cities and towns of the State. 

Indiana, whose prohibition went into effect in July, 1918, at once showed 
the same symptoms of improvement that we have noted in other dry States. 


“ WHY ‘ BONE DRY ’ STATE CONSTITUTIONAL PROHIBITION? » 75 

The workhouse of Marion County, containing Indianapolis, the capital city of 
the btate, was soon closed as a result of prohibition. There was always plenty 
of patronage to keep it going while the saloons were open. By the closing of 
the institution, the Board of County Commissioners were saved the annual 
expenses of the workhouse, which has been approximately $35,000 a year, and 
thus was made up to the taxpayers from one source alone almost half of the 
$80,841 which the county had received in fees from liquor licenses in 1917. 

When Indiana had been two months under prohibition, April and May, 1918, 
the State Anti-Saloon League compiled statistics from 21 representative cities 
on the results, which were as follows: 

The Anti-Saloon League of Indiana has compiled statistics from 21 cities 
showing the number of arrests for April and May, dry, and the number of ar¬ 
rests for the same months last year, under license. These figures are supplied 
by the city clerks of^ cities including the following: Birknell, Clinton, Columbus, 
Crown Point, Dunkirk, Evansville, Fort Wayne, Garrett, Huntington, Indian¬ 
apolis, Kendallville, Logansport, Madison, Marion, Mishawaka, North Vernon, 
Richmond, Seymour, South Bend, Tell City and Vincennes. 

These figures show that there were 968 fewer arrests for all causes in 
April this year than last, or a reduction of 34 per cent. 

There were 1,184 fewer arrests for all causes in May, this year, than last, 
or a reduction of 41 per cent. 

There were 616 fewer arrests for all causes in May, this year, than in 
March, or a reduction of 26 per cent. 

There were 694 fewer arrests for drunkenness in April, this year, than in 
April, 1917, or a falling off of 77 per cent. 

There were 622 fewer arrests for this offense in May, this year, than in 
May, 1917, or a reduction of 70 per cent. 

There were also 452 fewer arrests in April, this year, than in March, this 
year, a reduction of 68 per cent. 

We quote next an influential testimony that was signed in Detroit, June 22, 
1918, after fifty-two days under Michigan's new prohibition law. It was sent 
to a hearing in Congress in support of war prohibition, but it is favorable 
working of State prohibition, which they unitedly certify as the very foremost 
business men: 

“ Detroit is the largest city in America under prohibition. The prohibition 
law went into effect here on May i of this year. A great number of our leading 
industrial concerns are working on immense contracts for war material. It will, 
therefore, be seen that the experience of our large industries as touching the point 
raised in the objection of the Shipping Board to prohibition is not only valuable 
but conclusive on this point.* 

“If the Shipping Board and others who object to war emergency prohibi¬ 
tion on the ground that it will cause disorganization of labor or revolution among 
industrial workers, will but study the experience of Detroit, they will find that 
their anxiety on this matter is totally unfounded. After an unexcelled oppor¬ 
tunity of studying the value of prohibition in its relation to industrial efficiency, 
our conviction is that no measure of conservation would be more valuable to 
our country and its interests at this time than war emergency prohibition. 

* Liquor interests circulated rumors industriously that prohibition had driven many workmen from 
Detroit. As there is a labor shortoge all over the country and the Government is drawing men from 
everywhere there was a chance to make the lie seem plausible, but, as always in such cases, examination 
showed no loss of good workmen due to adoption of the dry policy. The only loss tO' Detroit from 
prohibition is the twenty-five per cent, loss of business—in local courts. 



76 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


“We therefore respectfully submit these considerations and appeal to our 
National Congress for early favorable action in behalf of this legislation. 

Henry M. Leland, president Lincoln Motor Car Co.; Joseph Boyer, presi¬ 
dent Burroughs Adding Machine Co.; F. S. Bigler, treasurer and gen¬ 
eral manager Michigan Bolt & Nut Co.; A. R. Demory, vice president 
the Timken Detroit Axle Co.; John Trix, president American Injector 
Co.; S. S. Kresge, president S. S. Kresge Co.; Frank P. Johnson, presi¬ 
dent Detroit Screw Works; F. F. Beall, vice president Packard Motor 
Car Co.; Richard H. Webber, president J. L. Hudson Co.; Chas. M. 
Carson, manager Cadillac Motor Car Co.; Richard H. Scott, vice presi¬ 
dent and general manager Reo Motor Car Co.; Chester M. Culver, sec¬ 
retary Employers’ Association of Detroit.” 

Unless many more prisoners are sentenced by Kent County and Grand 
Rapids courts to serve terms upon the Kent County work-farm in the near 
future this institution will have to he abandoned. Before the State went dry 
there always were more than 25 men at work upon the farm. When the terms 
of the men now upon the farm expire. Manager Bolt will be left alone. The 
same situation exists at the county jail. Sheriff Berry reports. Before May i 
there were more than 80 prisoners at the jail. Now the number has fallen to 
below 30 and is getting smaller every day. 

Here it is appropriate to add a similar incident from North Dakota that 
proves more than many statistics. I was at a State Sunday School Convention 
in that dry State in the town of Devil’s Lake. Strange as it may seem in a 
town of such a name the county jail was empty, and as it was a building of 
fine appointments and there was not room enough in town to house all the 
delegates, the ministers were all sent to jail, which was called the “ Sheriff’s 
Hotel.” Let some wet State match this and the Michigan story if they can. We 
can multiply them from other dry States. 

The opponents of prohibition are forever citing some old story about alleged 
non-enforcement of prohibition in Maine, as if that was the only prohibition 
State to judge by. Let them cite some new proofs from at least two or three 
of the twenty-eight States under prohibition or “ forever hold their peace.” As 
for Maine there have been times during the almost three score years and ten 
that prohibition has been in force in Maine when the law has not been enforced 
up to the hilt, but it means much that the people of Maine have nevertheless 
preferred it all this time to the license laws whose working they have seen in 
nearby States, and in 1918 strengthened their law by giving the Governor power 
to remove sheriffs who neglect enforcement. Those who cite violations of the 
liquor laws as if they were peculiar to prohibition States should ponder the 
statistics given elsewhere showing there is more illegal liquor selling in license 
States than in prohibition States, and the worse legalized selling besides. 

Prohibition Tested in Coerced Dry Cities of the South. 

Mrs. Elizabeth Tilton, Chairman Poster Committee of Boston Associated 
Charities, gives following results of a personal investigation of four Southern 
cities that went “ dry ” against their will: Savannah, Ga., Richmond, Va., Charles¬ 
ton and Columbia, S. C. 

The records were taken in the early part of 1917, when the South was under 
neither old-fashioned nor new-fashioned prohibition, but something between the 
two. The old variety was, no saloons, no public sale, but unlimited importation 


“ WHY ‘ BONE DRY ’ STATE CONSTITUTIONAL PROHIBITION? ” 77 

for private use. Since July i, 1917, we have “bone-dry prohibiiton/’ allowing 
no importation for private use. Between the old, loose measure of unlimited 
importation for personal use, and the “ bone-dry ” measure, came a period of 
no saloons, no sale, and limited importation for private use. 

I went to the four southern cities named, every one of them, as I said, 
forced to go “dry” against their will, by the vote of the State. Did it work? 
It did. 

Take Charleston, South Carolina, the last spot on earth where one would 
expect prohibition to work. Lovely, wistful, finely-wrought, it fights all change. 
The past is the present. Though this is digression, I can not refrain from illus¬ 
trating by saying that at a tea one afternoon, a lady pointed out the lovely Mrs. 
So-and-So: “ Such a tragedy over the whole family, you know! ” she said. 

I did not “ know,” but found out that the tragedy happened 145 years before 
I came to the town, when an ancestor was ranged as a Tory. Places where 
tragedies adhere 145 years, fight prohibition by nature. Charleston abhorred 
it. “ Never,” said the Chief of Police, “ have I had to do my duty without 
the backing of the best people.” “ What Charleston wants is high license,” said 
a leading minister. “ Imagine my having to buy a gallon a month of whiskey 
when all I need is a quart. It is an outrage.” 

The abstinence sentiment might be said to be still in a “ Charles the First ” 
state, and yet here is the curious thing, prohibition was helping. Emergency 
cases, street wounds, and so forth, had been cut more than half in the main 
hospital where the poor go, and alcoholism had also suffered a great diminution, 
and at the county jail arrests for drunkenness had fallen thus: 

Number of persons committed for drunkenness to the Charleston County 
jail, 1912, (wet), 432; 1916 (dry), 237; with no corresponding increase in drug 
cases. 

There was, of course, and usually is, a factor that enters into prohibition. 
The better people of the South abhor lynching, and there is a real movement 
for law enforcement in South Carolina. Many men wanted law-enforcement 
who did not, perhaps, want prohibition. Wishing to help this, the Country Club 
and the Charleston Club had given up the use of all liquors. You would see 
stately gentlemen ring the bell at the Charleston Club, and call for a “ glass of 
water.” This fine feeling for law-enforcement, in a way, made up for the lack 
of abstinence sentiment, and thus in Charleston, South Carolina, that haunt of 
things lovely and things past, modern, gallon-a-month prohibition was helping. 

The proof of the pudding is in the eating: prohibition in Charleston worked 
better than “ dispensary ” saloons. 

Coming to Savannah, Georgia, we found a city forced “ dry ” against its 
will, but reconciled by results. Everywhere we went, hospitals, police stations, 
banks, retail merchants’ associations, it was the same. “ We fought it, but we 
are converted; prohibition helps.” 

“ Two years ago,” said Dr. Brunner, secretary of Savannah’s Sanitary Com¬ 
mission and a leading health expert of the country, “ I called prohibition poppy¬ 
cock, hut prohibition enforced is a mighty good thing, and we've got that mighty 
good thing here.” Dr. Brunner declared that the prison chain gang that keeps 
Savannah drained and standing—the city is built in a swamp—had about six to 
seven hundred members before prohibition came, but in August, after three 
months of dryness, the gang has fallen to about two hundred, and thus it has 
stayed ever since. 


78 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


“ And look at my homicides,” cried the enthusiast. “ Prohibition began 
May I, 1916. 

In 1915,—24 homicides (negro by negro). 

In 1916,—10 homicides (negro by negro), 


and eight of these 1916 homicides took place before prohibition became the law.” 

“ Who fought prohibition hardest ? ” I asked. The answer was, “ The rich 
and fashionable.” “ Where are they ? ” “ Over on the bay.” So to the bay I 

went, to the Cotton Exchange over the river. 

The Secretary, Mr. Teesdale, said: “ No, we were not for prohibition here. 
Bitter were the complaints at first, especially when a saloon opposite closed at 
which it was said the Exchange spent $10,000 a year. But gradually we got 
used to it, and as the reduced wreckage and better business resulting from pro¬ 
hibition came more and more to our ears, the men at the Exchange became 
reconciled, and now I think very few of them would like to see the saloon back. 
The fact is, prohibition is good for a town” 

It evidently was good for that loveliest of American cities, Savannah, as 
police records showed thus: 

“Arrests for drunkenness had fallen (comparing the ten months before 
and after prohibition) from 2,117 to 1,052, or 51 per cent. 

“ Arrests for assault with intent to murder, from 49 to 18, or 64 per cent. 
Lunacy, from 61 to 28, or 54 per cent., and so on.” 

One thing I wish especially to note before leaving Savannah, in view of 
the prohibition fight that is coming: the brewers, who really are the great owners 
of the saloons, and the wine interests will make a fight for “ a separate peace for 
wine and beer,” and many academic people will say, “ Excellent, get rid of dis¬ 
tilled liquor, but keep wine for our club men, and beer for the working man.” 
Carlyle said: “How beautiful to die of a broken heart—on paper! Quite an¬ 
other thing in practice! ” Wine and beer schemes are precisely like that, they 
sound well on paper, but in practice they do not work out. 

From 1908 to 1916 Georgia was under a law that forbade the sale of dis¬ 
tilled liquors in saloons but allowed the sale of light or “ near-beer.” It simply 
did not work. The saloons once open-would sell whiskey as well as beer, and 
as for the beer being '‘light beer,” Judge Broyles of Atlanta said, “A light or 
‘ near-beer' law is practically unenforceable as you can not have a chemist 
with every barrel to see that the beer is light.” Georgia’s light beer scheme 
was a failure, as beer experiments have always been. 

Coming to Columbia, South Carolina, we found the same reduction under 
prohibition, thus: 

1914 (wet) 1915 (wet) 1916 (dry) 

Total arrests. 8,421 8,417 5 ,i 73 

Arrests for drunkenness.. 1,008 1,006 341 

Drunk and disorderly. 979 789 365 

A young man said, “ Oh, the men in 1916 were more prosperous and so paid 
their fines and thus did not get recorded, hence the decrease.” This proved to 
be not true, the number of fines paid being: 1914, 3,832; 1915, 3,262; 1916, 2,780. 

While prosperity may enter in, and other factors, prohibition does seem 

TO BE THE MAIN FACTOR IN THE REDUCTION OF WRECKAGE. 


It is generally thought that the main reason that the South is under pro¬ 
hibition is because it fears the negro in liquor. There may be something in 
this, but the South does not seem to think there is much. The South is old 
American, they said, with 96 per cent, of the population native born, and the 




“ WHY ‘ BONE DRY ’ STATE CONSTITUTIONAL PROHIBITION? ” 79 

bulk of the people living outside the cities. Rural American populations, still 
gomg sedulously to the Baptist or Methodist Church, come early into abstinence 
and prohibition. “ When a man in North Carolina wants to run for Congress, 
first he takes a Sunday school class, then he gets to be the superintendent, and 
then he is ready to run for Congress.’' 

As you approach the towns, the signs read: “ Good Churches, Good. Clubs,” 
and you come last to “ Good Factory Sites.” Great, agricultural, Anglo-Saxon 
populations vote naturally, under a little prodding, for prohibition—hence the 
rapidity of the movement in the South. 

Virginia is precisely such a State as I have described; hence it goes “ dry ” 
long before Massachusetts or New York, the latter being States where you have 
great urban populations made up of the very poor and the very rich, both classes 
that do not respond so readily to that which saves the race as do the people that 
are neither submerged with poverty nor riches. (In Massachusetts, 92 per cent, 
of the population live in cities and of the 29 estates of the people in the nation 
at large that have an annual income of over $2,000,000 almost all live in the 
Eastern or near Eastern States.) 

In Richmond, Virginia, we struck hard the philosophical anarchists, fight¬ 
ing prohibition on the ground of “ personal liberty.” It was there that Patrick 
Henry said, “ Give me liberty or give me death,” and anti-prohibitionists had 
gone up and down the State before the election, declaring that prohibition meant 
the knell of Patrick Henry’s ideal. But even so, prohibition had come, and 
what is more, was working for betterment. The conservative paper, the News 
and Leader, which had fought prohibition, had been converted “ because,” said 
Dr. Freeman the editor, “ The thing works. We confess we understimated our 
power to get the law enforced.” “ The churches did it,” he added. Dr. Free¬ 
man told us that in the negro quarters, cash receipts after prohibition incrased 
from 25 to 50 per cent. “ Generally speaking,” he said, “ pauperism is at the 
lowest ebb, I have ever known it, and while prosperity is playing its part, pro¬ 
hibition is also responsible for this low pauperism. No lockers are allowed in 
any Richmond club, and every club in the city has ruled to enforce the law and 
to expel all backsliders.” 

All this came from a recent convert—and there were many such. Old 
Judge Crutchfield, of the Police Court—judge there off and on for forty-five 
years—said: ‘'Put it down, Crutchfield voted wet as a rag, hut the thing helps 
mightily, so put it down also that next time Crutchfield votes dry wih a big D.” 

The thing did help. We went to institution after institution, and everywhere 
the records showed a sudden marked fall in the months of November and 
December, 1916, after prohibition was introduced. For example, during the 
first month of prohibition the State jail population showed a decline of 49 per 
cent.; the second month of 50 per cent. People often object to short records. 
A longer one comes from the State penitentiary: Average number of prisoners 
for the five Decembers before prohibition, 97; December after prohibition, 70; 
for five Januaries before prohibition, 42; January after, 22; for five Februaries 
before prohibition, 58; February after prohibition, 35. 

Judge Ricks, whose Juvenile and Domestic Relations Court is truly remark¬ 
able, was strong for prohibition, and his court records showed a sudden and 
continuous decline in wife-beatings and cases of non-support following pro- 

hibitmn.^ so it was everywhere. The men who had fought prohibition hardest 
were convinced that it was “ better for business and better for buyers.” 


80 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


Virginia has an excellent law and a Commissioner to enforce the law. 
There was some trouble with patent medicines, though the law is framed so as 
to cure this weak spot in prohibition. But, despite boot-legging and patent 
medicines containing alcohol, the law was working great betterment. 

The race that survives is the race that seizes betterment wherever 

IT CAN. As WE are VIRILE, SO SHALL WE DEVELOP PROHIBITION. It WILL BE A 
STEP BY STEP PROCESS, BUT IN THE END, IF WE BACK THE PROCESS WITH CONSTANT 
EDUCATION FOR TOTAL ABSTINENCE, IT WILL LAND US IN A WELL-NIGH DRINKLESS 
WORLD, AND THE WHITE RACE WILL HAVE LEFT BEHIND ANOTHER GREAT DRAG ON 
ITS UPWARD PROGRESS, JUST AS IT LONG AGO LEFT BEHIND HUMAN SACRIFICE AND 
MORE RECENTLY SLAVERY. 

Prohibition helps, therefore help prohibition, should be one of the slogans 
of good citizenship. 

During March and April, 1918, the following statements were made by the 
Governors of prohibition States: 

Arkansas: Governor Hays, “ Ninety per cent, fewer arrests for drunken¬ 
ness. Prohibition a decided success.’" 

Arizona: Governor Hunt, “ Since prohibition went into force, marked 
decrease in commitments to prison and insane hospital; needy families per¬ 
ceptibly decreased; no adverse effect upon legitimate business.” 

Colorado: Governor Carlson, “ Two thousand new savings accounts opened 
in one month; collections in department stores broke all records; credit men 
report many over-due accounts (deemed uncollectable), paid up. Crime re¬ 
duced greatly. Prohibition a great success.” 

Idaho: Governor Alexander, “ The results of prohibition are most satis¬ 
factory. Never such beneficial results from any other measure in so short a 
time; savings banks’ deposits increased; Boise chief of police and four police¬ 
men dismissed because no longer needed; police courts deserted; city and county 
jail empty; accidents decreased.” 

Iowa: Governor Clark, “ Prohibition has reduced arrests from 40 to 45 
per cent.; commitments to State hospitals greatly decreased; demands on poor 
fund much improved; importation of intoxicants reduced nine-tenths.” 

Kansas: Governor Capper, “ Wealth per capita greater than any liquor 
State; death rate lowest per capita; bank deposits largest of any State; no open 
bar-rooms and two million people who never saw a liquor saloon; an auto¬ 
mobile to every fifth family.” 

Maine: Governor Milliken, “ The honest efforts of all officials charged 
with the enforcement of the prohibition law in Maine have brought about a 
condition so satisfactory that all discussion of the wisdom of the law has per¬ 
manently ended.” 

North Carolina: Governor Kerr, “The benefits of prohibition are great 
and are continually increasing. Twenty-one per cent, more children attending 
school; bank deposits increased 100 per cent.; building and loan association 
stock increased 250 per cent.” 

North Dakota: Governor Hanna, “Both from the moral and financial 
standpoints, prohibition has been a success in North Dakota.” 

Tennessee: Governor Rye, “We have lost the liquor traffic and we are 
glad; crime reduced; streets free from drunkards; bank deposits enormously 
increased; property more valuable; life safer; people more prosperous and 
happier; public morals on a higher plane.” 


WHY ‘BONE DRY’ STATE CONSTITUTIONAL PROHIBITION? 


81 


Virginia: Governor Hatfield, “Business has improved; arrests decreased; 
insane commitments less; savings banks’ deposits swelled; prohibition a great 
success.” 

Should Prohibition Spare Wine and Beer? 

It is an amazing illustration of how little this hustling age knows of history 
that the ITearst papers’ “ drive ” to exclude beer and wine from American pro¬ 
hibition has in California secured the endorsement of some temperance forces, 
having previously gotten some respectability by the President’s successful in¬ 
terposition in Congress to get a “ separate peace for beer,” but only on the 
ground that it was necessary to prevent delay of the food bill. It should be 
noted that while Congress yielded only to avoid a filibuster, all other motions 
in Congress to exclude beer or wine or both from prohibition laws have been 
voted down by large majorities. For example, in the Flouse on December 17, 
1917, an amendment to allow 3 per cent, beer and 14 per cent, wine was defeated 
by the Representatives of all the people by a vote of 237 to 107. Great Britain 
fully proved by tragic and disgraceful experience long ago, as Massachusetts and 
Georgia have more recently that drunkenness is not decreased by limiting liquor 
selling to wine and beer. 

And the numerous experiments in European and American laboratories 
showing that single indulgence in moderate portions of wine and beer impair 
sight and touch and aim and almost every power of body and mind, make it a 
badge of ignorance or deceit for any one to assume either that the only evil of 
drinking is getting drunk, or that the only harmful drink is whiskey. 

Miss Cora Frances Stoddard in an up-to-date collection of data made in 
1918 for The Welfare Orator, published by the International Reform Bureau, 
presents the following facts which should discredit and defeat any effort in 
State legislature or Congress to separate wine and beer from its long time 
partnership with whiskey. All these Booze Brothers have done the devil’s 
work together in their lives, and in the near hour appointed for their death 
they should not be divided. Miss Stoddard says: 

“ It was a beer and wine quantity of alcohol (equivalent to two or three 
o-lasses of four per cent, beer or half pint of ten per cent, wine) that Kraepelin 
found impaired the perception and attention needed by lookouts, signal men, 
sentries, engineers, automobile drivers, machinists and others in militaiw and 
civil life. 

“ It was beer and wine quantities of alcohol (equivalent to one-fourth glasses 
of beer or one-fifth to four-fifths of a pint of wine) that Joss found decreased 
in adult students the power of attention, concentration, mental keenness 4.9 per 
cent, the first hour, 10.9 per cent, the second hour, 12.5 per cent, the third hour. 

“ It was beer or wine quantity of alcohol (equivalent to two glasses of 
beer or a half pint of wine) that Totterman found markedly reduced the co¬ 
ordination of eye and hand work needed in range finding, sextant-observing, 
sighting of guns, delicate machine work of all kinds. 

“ It was a beer and wine quantity of alcohol (equivalent to three-fourths of 
a pint of wine or a little over four glasses of beer) that Frankfurther found 
increased 17 times the relative number of errors in typewriting. 

“ It was a wine quantity of alcohol (equivalent to four-fifths of a pint of 
wine) that Aschaffenberg found decreased the amount of work done by type¬ 
setters 8.7 per cent. 


82 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


“ It was beer and wine quantities of alcohol (equivalent to about two pints 
of beer or three-fourths of a pint of wine) that Kraepelin found impaired ac¬ 
curacy in marksmanship in the Bavarian Anny. 

“ It was beer and wine quantities of alcohol (the equivalent of two and four- 
glasses of beer or one pint of wine) that Lieutenant Boy of the Swedish Army 
found reduced endurance in shooting 22^4 per cent. 

“ It was beer and wine quantities of alcohol (the equivalent of two and four- 
tenths glasses of beer) taken daily that Smith found impaired ability to memorize 
and to add numbers. 

“ It was beer and wine quantities of alcohol (equivalent to two to two and 
one-tliird glasses of beer, or lo ounces of wine) that Durig and Schnyder found 
diminished muscle working ability in lifting and mountain climbing and increased 
fatigue. 

It was beer and wine quantities of alcohol that in practically all these 
experiments misled the person using the alcohol into thinking that he was work¬ 
ing better, when actually his work was poorer. 

“ It was beer and wine quantities of alcohol (equivalent to one and one-half 
to two and one-third pints of beer or lo to 15 ounces of wine) that Dodge and 
Benedict, of the Carnegie Nutrition Laboratory, Boston, found definitely de¬ 
pressed combined nerve and muscle activity. This with other results gave 
clear indication of decreased organic efficiency as a result of moderate doses 
of alcohol.” 

The amounts of alcohol used in ike foregoing experiments are commonly 
taken in zmne or beer by hundreds of thousands of drinkers. They have been 
proven to decrease physical and mental-working ability and to shorten life.*'* 

The Crux of Bone Dry ” Prohibition. 

These statements of the impairment of efficiency by the most moderate 
drinking of the mildest liquors, whether the alcohol is taken into the system 
when on dutv or off duty—since the effect abides for days—brings us to THE 
VERY CRUX OF “ BONE DRY ” PROHIBITION. OUR FIGHT HAS 
BEEN SO LONG “ ANTI-SALOON ” THAT IT IS HARD TO REALIZE 
IT IS NOW ^^ANTI-ALCOHOL.” THE CHANGE IS AS RADICAL AS 
FROM THE OLD MODERATION PLEDGES TO THE TEETOTAL 
PLEDGE; AS GREAT AS BETWEEN THE MEANING OF LIBERTY IN 
OUR DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE—LIBERTY FOR WHITE 
MEN ONLY—AND LIBERTY SINCE THE EMANCIPATION PROCLA¬ 
MATION MADE IT APPLY TO ALL MEN. IN THIS ‘‘ BONE DRY 
ERA WE WORK FOR MORE THAN “ A SALOONLESS NATION 
AN ALCOHOL-FREE LAND. 

In Germany’s atrocities scientists find a horrible example of what daily 
use of beer by a wdiole nation from childhood does to a nation. 

That strong drink played a most prominent part in the atrocities committed 
by the Germans in Belgium in the early days of the war, becomes more and more 
evident as one writer after another relates the history of those days. One of 
the latest to give testimony of this sort is the Baroness Huard, who was Miss 
Frances Wilson of New Rochelle, N. Y. She married Baron Charles Huard, 
a French artist, and her country home. Chateau de Villiers, about 60 miles frorn 
Paris, was used by Von Kluck and other high German officers as headquarters. 

* This article may be found in full in Concessional Record June 27, 1917, p. 4741, also in booklet 
supplied by International Reform Bureau, Washmgton. D. C. at 0 cents each, postpaid. 



83 


“ WHY ‘BONE DRY' STATE CONSTITUTIONAL PROHiBiTlON?" 

III American Nlagazine, August, 1918, she describes the unspeakable iilthy con¬ 
dition in which they left her home. 

“ It was not the kind of dirt which might unavoidably be brought into 
a liouse thus occupied: the mud from roads and fields—that sort of thing. It 
wasn’t natural untidiness of improvised officers, or of rooms not cared for by 
servants. It was simply disgusting filth and the debris of wanton, malicious 
destruction. Furnishings which could not be removed were deliberately ruined. 
And this ruin was accomplished by methods so revolting that even a self-respect¬ 
ing savage would have been ashamed of them. Why any kind of men, let alone 
those of supposed education and breeding, should deliberately have made an 
Augean stable of a house in which they themselves were living is beyond the 
comprehension of an ’ unkultured ’ intelligence like mine. But that is what they 
did. It could not have been got into such a state of any hasty effort after they 
knew that they were going to leave it. They must have lived in the filth they 
made. Unlike many old continental houses, the chateau %ras fitted with modern 
toilet arrangements. But these seemed to appeal to German staff officers only 
moderately—except as a means of dishonoring the American flag.” ( Such a 
flag was found, the writer states, clogging the waste pipe of one of tlio toilets.) 

■■ Instead the satin hangings, corners of the rooms, the beds, and other equally 
inappropriate places, were assigned a role which the modern plumbing arrange¬ 
ments made unnecessary, to say the least.” 

The baroness herself gives the explanation of this state of things, and of 
the minds responsible for them, when she states: ‘'The drazving-room when I 
got hack home looked like a cheap beer garden after a Saturday nighfs riot. 
Only, in this case, it had been a champagne orgy, for J^ilUers is in the heart of 
the champagne district” 

The rape and murder that came to Belgium as from a Pandora's box from 
the Germans’ capture of its great stores of wine and beer represents a still worse 
form of the savagery which alcohol promoted in men already too cruel and 
licentious. The defeat of Germany in the first battle of the Marne is also 
attributed in part to the wflnes of Belgium and Northern France by both French 
and German writers, adding to the alcohol harvest of brutality the second crop 
of inefficiency. The wine ration there spelled retreat for the most powerful 
army in the world at that time. 

Alcohol Dries Up the Finest Cells of the Brain. 

Alcohol taken in any beverage flies at once to the two great centers of life, 
the headquarters of the voluntary and involuntary nervous systems, the brain 
and organs of parenthood. Every drop of beer kills a cell. The alcohol dries 
up the top of the brain as a sirocco wind would dry up apple blossoms in the 
top of the tree. The higher and finer brain cells that civilization has added to 
the savage brain, those that prompt us to kindness and justice and service and 
sacrifice, are thus destroyed, leaving the savage brain with modern bombs and 
submarines in place of club and arrowheads for its wppons. 

What alcohol has done to the German nation it will do to both individuals 
and nations that adopt its daily use, and our soldiers’ contacts abroad make 
this a ver>' real peril for our future. The daily use of alcohol by workingmen 
not only lowers efficiency, but makes them brutal, and so makes more perilous 
the coming days of industrial reconstruction. In the light of these facts let us 
oonder as the very key of our new bone dry ” prohibition the following words 
of Dr. Eugene Lvman Fisk, of the Life Extension Institute, speaking to New 


84 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


York Industrial Safety Congress in December, 1917 (see published proceed¬ 
ings) : 

“ It might be thought paradoxical that alcohol is a depressant and yet pro¬ 
duces apparent stinmlation. It does that by dulling what we call the inhibitory 
elements of the brain that have to do with conduct, those higher elements that 
govern our conduct with our fellows. They are blunted, and there is a release 
of the lower activities. I have mentioned that as the lower activities recover, 
the higher come under the influence of alcohol, and that explains such action. 

A MAN IS LED TO ACTION BY ALCOHOL, BUT ACTION BY THE LOWER MAN, THE 
PRIMITIVE man; the CAVE MAN COMES TO LIFE AS THE CIVILIZED, TRAINED, POISED 
MAN GOES TO SLEEP. That is how alcohol can at one and the same time be a 
stimulant and a depressant, but there should be no mistake about this—there 
is no real stimulation, there is no real direct action on the heart or on the nervous 
system. It is only that one activity arises through the paralysis of an¬ 
other ACTIVITY OF A HIGHER SORT.''' 

This passage should be profoundly pondered by thousands of fairly good 
men who have long been “ anti-saloon ” as a matter of public policy but are not 
yet “ anti-alcohol ” in personal practice. They have cheered attacks on the 
saloon and generously financed them, but have taken a drink occasionally, if not 
daily, and they even patronize saloons while they remain. They expect when 
saloons are legally closed to still get their drinks, if not by importation into dry 
territory, at least when traveling in wet cities. Some of them keep some of 
the wet goods in their own homes. Those who have hitherto called such men 
“ hypocrites ” have missed the mark. Prohibition from 1851 to 1917 did not and 
could not prohibit “ importation for personal use.’' Its aim was only to close 
saloons, to stop the sale in certain areas, because saloons promote drinking, and 
become “ germ centers of lawlessness,” as the president of the Catholic Univer¬ 
sity reminds us. But now the national Reid law provides that when a State 
forbids manufacture and sale of intoxicating liquors it shall be “ bone dry,” 
that is, there can be no legal importation. Every loyal friend of prohibition is 
therefore hound to give up personal use and induce all others to do so in this 
hone dry ” era, lest much illegal personal use cause repeal of the law. The 
foregoing words of Dr. Fisk and others that give evidence of the effect of 
moderate occasional drinking on efficiency of thinkers as well as workers, should 
therefore be made known to everybody, that prohibition may be culminated 

AND SEALED BY EACH MAN CLOSING THE DRINKING PLACE” UNDER HIS OWN 
NOSE. 


Home Protection. 

We temperance speakers commonly stress the economic appeal for pro¬ 
hibition, that diverting the golden stream of Avasted money from the saloons 
will give more profits to every honest business and so more wages to workers 
and more money for raw materials to farmers. But to all these men the family 

IS REALLY A HIGHER "" INTEREST.” It IS FOR THE SAKE OF WIFE AND CHILDREN 
CHIEFLY THAT MEN TOIL. ThE ARGUMENT OF HOME PROTECTION” IS THERE¬ 
FORE THE STRONGEST ARGUMENT, EXCEPT THE SUPREME PATRIOTIC AND HUMANI¬ 
TARIAN ARGUMENT, THAT WE MUST SUPPRESS THE SALOONS TO FIGHT THE WAR 
THROUGH WITH OUR FULL STRENGTH TO SPEEDY VICTORY. 

The home protection argument, though strong, need not be long, for is 
self-evident. I believe that another “ crusade ” Avould be worth while, in which 
men as well as women would visit saloons, preferably without publicity and 


WHY ‘BONE DRY’ STATE CONSTITUTIONAL PROHIBITION? 


85 


singly or in small groups in a kindly spirit and ask liquor sellers to quit even 
before they are compelled to do so, for the sake of their own families, daily 
oppressed with shame in school and church and street because they are related 
to this dishonorable business. Here is a fresh story that should encourage such 
quiet crusading. 

Can a New York hotel, one of the real hotels that are a part of the life of 
the city, of the spirit of the thousands who come there for a holiday, be operated 
successfully without a bar? Frank Case, proprietor of the Algonquin for the 
last fourteen years, says “ Yes,” and feels sufficiently sure of it to apply the only 
r^l test. ^ Fie closed his bar recently, and it will stay closed. He announced 
his intention to a group of friends at the hotel. “Why?” asked one of them 
after they had recovered from their astonishment. “ Well, there's one reason 

RIGHT THERE,” REPLIED CaSE, POINTING TO A SMALL BOY CROSSING THE HOTEL 
LOBBY WITH A BUNCH OF SCHOOL BOOKS UNDER HIS ARM, ON HIS WAY TO THE 
FAMILY APARTMENT UPSTAIRS. “ThAT YOUNGSTER IS MY OWN SON, JUST COM¬ 
ING HOME FROM SCHOOL. I HAVE DECIDED THAT I DON't WANT TO PAY HIS SCHOOL 
BILLS AND THE OTHER COSTS OF BRINGING HIM UP ON TPIE PROFITS FROM BOOZE. 
I GUESS that's my CHIEF REASON, BUT THERE ARE OTHERS. 

‘‘ The bar got too profitable last year, or probably I would not have thought 
of this thing. It never had amounted to much previously. It wasn't a real 
business asset as a bar for stand-up drinking by the people who ran in from the 
street for the sake of drinking aifd nothing else, but only a source of supply for 
the people who lived in the house and wanted wine or cocktail or highballs at 
luncheon or dinner. That was all I wanted it or intended it should be. I did 
not give the personal attention to the profits from it that I would to the profit 
on a poached egg. 

“ But something happened to the bar in 1916. I had a new man in charge 
of it, and he went in for business. He got it. At the end of the year the 
figures showed that my net profits on the bar alone had been $10,560. Now, I 
like to make money as well as the next man. That is what I am in the hotel 
business for. I am not a prohibitionist nor a temperance missionary, and I have 
no right nor desire to interfere with the personal liberty of a patron of my hotel. 
Nevertheless, those figures made me sick. I had to admit to myself that I was 
a rumseller, and that is something I don’t want to be. I am a hotelkeeper, and 
believe that a distinction can and should be made between the two jobs. I am 
going to make it. 

“ Of course I’ll have to admit that it has taken me three months to come to 
the scratch because a human being hates to let go of $10,000 a year as a matter 
of sentiment before he is sure he can make it up somewhere else. I don't 
know yet that I can make it up, but I’ll have all that barroom space for extra 
dining-room or some other purpose.” 

How Drink Handicaps Childhood. 

Mr. Charles Stelzle, in exposing the fallacy of one of the most laborious 
defenses of the liquor traffic in the “ Anti-Prohibition Manual,” opens up the 
pathetic sufferings of childhood, beginning before birth, because of parental 
drinking. He says: 

“ After spending a month in the Carnegie Library in Pittsburgh studying 
the criminal records of the world, an investigator for the liquor men found that 
56 per cent of all criminals were abandoned in childhood. 


86 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


“ He made this study to prove that the liquor business is not responsible for 
the large number of criminals which prohibitionists say it produces. 

How does it happen that so large a percentage of the criminal class were 
abandoned in childhood? What kind of parents did they have? 

Those who have lived and labored amongst the poorest people in our great 
cities for many years declare that comparatively few children are abandoned on 
account of poverty. Usually a mother will work herself to death, rather than 
abandon her child, no matter how poor she may be. 

“ Ordinarily, children are deserted by their parents because these parents 
have become sodden and depraved through the use of strong drink. 

So that in the last analysis we may charge up to the use of liquor the 
desertion of babies and little children—indeed it has been clearly demonstrated 
by a most comprehensive study that 45 per cent of the child desertion in this 
country is due to the liquor habit?' 

Mr. David Reid, Superintendent of Hope Mission, Boston, my associate in 
three prohibition automobile tours, who has seen much of the home tragedy 
written in mud and blood by the saloon, tells the following two-edged story in 
his street appeals to voters during prohibition campaigns: 

Perhaps some of you don’t care so long as the liquor traffic doesn’t hurt 
you and yours. Well, you are born but not buried. A certain gentleman in a 
Massachusetts city was importuned to vote ‘ No License ’ in the yearly city 
election. Roughly he replied: ‘ It is none of my business. Liquor never hurt 
me. If a man wants a drink, that is his concern.’ 

“ Well, we will see. Christmas soon came along, and he, wanting his six- 
year-old boy to be as well off as the other boys in the neighborhood, bought hirn 
a pretty .sled. A few days later sufficient snow fell to put the road in fine condi¬ 
tion for sledding. Johnnie saw the children of the neighborhood coasting dowr. 
the hill, and so he got out his sled to join them. At the foot of the hill was a 
manhole at which city employees were at work. Opposite the manhole was a 
saloon. These employees, thinking there was no harm in just stepping across 
and having a drink, did so. But while they were drinking Johnnie came scooting 
down the hill, and being inexperienced in guiding, went straight into the man¬ 
hole, plunging head first into the filthy sewerage. It was about an hour ere his 
lifeless body was recovered and brought home. Later in the afternoon, when the 
father came home from his daily toil, he pressed the electric button, expecting 
the usual kiss and welcome greeting of his faithful wife; but to his surprise the 
woman next door answered the call. Sunnising that something was wrong, be 
asked for his wife, and the neighbor pointed to another room. Nervously he 
opened the door, and there stood his wife in a stooping posture, looking on tlie 
lifeless form of their boy and only child, and weeping as if her heart would break. 
Wild-eyed he looked around asking for an explanation, but the wife, who wa- 
choking with sobs, could not speak. The neighbor, seeing the situation, told hin: 
the whole story. Then he vowed he would wage unceasing war against tlie 
saloon till it was swept from the land. The anguish of the drunkard’s wife and 
family had been nothing to him. But now he raged because he, too, had 
suffer. Ah^ we never can tell when this dread curse may visit our homes, .‘''o 
let us all join together and banish the deadly foe of all homes from the face 
of the earth.” 

Liquor Men’s Plea for Unity. 

The most pathetic argument of the liquor dealers for a stay of execution—an 
argument which they use alike against war prohibition, constitutional prohibition. 


"WHY ' BONE DRY’ STATE CONSTITUTIQNAE PROHIBITION?” 


State-wide and local prohibition—is that there should be no questions brought 
up in this war time on which the people are strongly divided; that we must 
avoid all contention and strife and maintain domestic peace while we are 
prosecuting foreign war. This plea sounds strangely from a trade which from 
the days of Solomon, three thousand years ago, has been noted as the occasion of 
'' contentions ” and wounds without cause ’’; a trade that has made friends 
and relatives slay each other, both promoted riots and lynching in the streets. 

But the supreme answer to this so-called argument is that the war itself, 
mlinitely more contentious than any strife of v/ords at home, is prolonged by 

the toleration of the liquor traffic, since it weakens every branch of our war work. 

THE PEACE THAT WE MOST NEED AND DESIRE IN THIS COUNTRY IS NOT THE 

PEACE OF SUPPRESSED OPINIONS, THAT IS, OF SUPPRESSED DEMOCRACY, OF WHICH 
POEITICAIv DISCUSSION IS THE VERY BREATH OF LIFE; NOT THE PEACE OF TOL¬ 
ERATED WRONG DOING, BUT THE PEACE THAT SHALL COME THROUGH VICTORY 
OVER THE EVIL POWERS WITH WHICH WE ARE FIGHTING. AND THE SHORT CUT TO 
THAT PEACE IS BY THE ELIMINATION OF WHAT THE GREAT LEADERS OF ALL THE 
allies have DECLARED TO BE A GREATER FOE THAN GERMANY, THE LIQUOR 
TRAFFIC, THAT SMITES WAR FORCES IN FRONT AND REAR, DISABLING SOLDIERS 
WITH UNSPEAKABLE DISEASES ON THE FIRING LINE; DISABLING MUNITION WORK¬ 
ERS WITH DRUNKENNESS; HINDERING TRANSPORTATION WITH ITS BEER BARRELS 
TRAVELING BOTH WAYS; EMBARRASSING THE FUEL SITUATION BY ITS VAST CON¬ 
SUMPTION OF COAL; AND WORST OF ALL, WEAKENING BY ITS DOMINATION OF 
POLITICS THE DEMOCRACY WHICH WE ARE FIGHTING TO GIVE TO THE WORLD. 

Here is an appealing- story of the largest coal mining camp in Utah “before” and “after” the 
State went “dry“There are a large number of coke ovens, and the labor is largely from the south 
of Europe. They were accustomed to drinking a great amount of light wines and beer, together with 
an occasional whiskey celebration. These men were violently opposed to prohibition, and declared that 
they could not ‘pull coke’ without their wines and beer. The amount of beer consumed there is un¬ 
believable. One who visited the camp after prohibition came in force was assured the tonnage ner man 
had greatly increased, and that families that never knew what proper living conditions meant, in spite 
of the fact that the head of the house earned high wages, were now well dressed, well fed, and found 
life worth living. Here are two representative cases: An Italian who had been a very heavy drinker, 
when asked about his beer said that it was very hard on him at first, and that he felt very bitter at 
not being allowed to indulge his personal liberty, but that now he realized the vast amount of good 
that had come to him in spite of himself. He said that the other day, having no place in particular 
to go because of the saloons being closed, and not being altogether weaned of his old habits, he went 
into the store and while looking around decided to take home some candy to his children. When he 
got home and his wife opened up the package and saw what he had done, she threw her arms about 
him and cried and cried, for, as he said, this was really the first time in his life that he had thought 
of doing such a thing and he was greatly impressed with its effect—an effect that he had not thought 
about at all. He told me this in his broken English, and liis face was wonderful to see as he related 
this experience. 

At another of the Utah coal camps, an American was never really sober, though he worked hard 
almost every day; was always behind, and only intelligent work on the part of the office force kept his 
family in food and clothing. He was continually garnisheed and always in debt. At a meeting of the 
officials at this camp after prohibition had had a chance this mnn was present, and it was proposed 
that as long as they were all together they^ might as well organize for the Third Liberty Bond issue. 
This had not been thought of before, but this man stepped out and said, “Yes, come on, boys; my wife 
thinks a great deal of me since I quit drinking; put me down for a bond. I’m going to show you 
fellows something.” And he reached into his pocket and took out a roll of money from which he 
paid for his $100 Bond IN CASH. 

We mast banish the drink and the vices that nest with it to ennoble our 
morale,” which is more than morals, more than personal character. “ Morale ” 
is the Christian hope and courage of a whole nation or a group of nations, that 
believe the world is no fortuitous concour.se of atoms but an ethical universe in 
step with God. Our confidence, in the words of Dr. Washington Gladden, is that 


" Fierce though the fiends may fight 
And long though the angels hide, 

We KNOW THAT THE TRUTH AND RIGHT 

Have the universe on their side.” 


88 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


Why No License.^ 

The first thing citizens need to be “ shown ” in a no-license campaign., 
under '' local option ’’ or “ local veto,” during this war time of world-wide 
vision, is that a fight for local prohibition is worth while. Drys and wets are 
both agreed that the United States is to be “A Saloonless Nation in 1920 ” 
by constitutional prohibition, “ for keeps ”; and saloonless sooner for the war 
period, with a probability the two prohibitions will overlap. Even in coun¬ 
tries where prohibition in large areas is nof imminent, there are some who 
need to be shown that the gains to be reasonably expected from local pro¬ 
hibition are worth the effort. 

The first answer to this query, so far as any sincere prohibitionist offers 
it, is that saloons will wreck many lives and many homes even in one place 
in one year, and will lower efficiency of workers at least ten per cent.^ and 
profits of honorable business at least as much, besides corrupting local poli¬ 
tics for selfish ends. 

A second answer is that it is more honorable for a town to become dry 
by its own choice than to be dragged into decency by State or national power. 

A third reason why local prohibition is worth while is, that it is a good 
training school for national prohibition. 

To the man who says sincerely. The wet areas beyond the town may be 
so easily reached by trolley and auto that it is useless to close the saloons 
in town, the answer is, that reducing facilities to drink always reduces the 
drinking and its consequences—even the closing of saloons in one village in 
a wet township, or one ward in a wet city. One of the most surprising facts 
developed by experiments with fractional prohibition is that saloon closing 
one day a week, Sunday, or one day or a few days in some emergency, greatly 
reduces drunkenness and crime. When Scotland closed saloons on Sunday 
only it reduced Sunday arrests seven-eighths. When the fuel crisis brought 
the United States in 1917 “ heatless Mondays,” with saloon closing, even 
Boston straightway found its police blotter without a blot. In the four 
heatless Mondays, Providence, R. I., had four arrests for drunkenness. From 
Mondays preceding show an average of ten arrests, that is 40 against 4 . 
W hen saloons were closed for a short period at the time of the earthquake in 
San Francisco, the wonderful effect in reducing crime started a demand for 
prohibition that was seen in 1917 in a prohibition majority of the votes of 
the State outside of San Francisco. Sweden has the strongest prohibition 
sentiment of any country in Europe, partly because of the demonstration of 
its value when all barrooms were closed in 1909 on account of a general 
strike. Closing out the liquor selling in one building, the National Capitol, 
it was the testimony of Congressmen, diminished drinking and its conse^ 
quences, even when Washington was a wet city with two bar rooms within 
a blocE With that fact fresh in mind the writer accepted an invitation to 
go to Kingston, Canada, to argue for so small a boon as ward prohibition. 
If prohibition even for one building with less than a thousand men under its 
roof would reduce drunkenness, surely it was worth while for a city ward 
with more than a thousand homes. 

License Makes it Easy to Drink, Hard to Abstain. 

That IS Jack London s simple explanation of his own drinking and the 
drinking of most others. Jack London was one of America’s most brilliant 


WHY NO LICENSE? 


89 


writers. He wrecked his life through drink, and died prematurely as a direct 
result of it. In a book entitled “John Barleycorn he told frankly the story 
of his struggles and defeat. He insists very strongly in that book that his 
failure was not due to an appetite for liquor—he says he disliked the 
taste—but to the fact that it was always easily accessible. His conclusion is 
given in these forceful words: 

“ The way to stop drinking is to stop it. The way China stopped the 
general use of opium was by stopping the cultivation and importation of 
opium. The philosophers, priests and doctors of China could have preached 
themselves breathless against opium for a thousand years, and the use of 
opium, so long as opium was ever accessible and obtainable, would have con¬ 
tinued unabated. We are so made, that is all. We have with great success 
made a practice of not leaving arsenic and strychnine, and typhoid and tuber¬ 
culosis germs, lying around for our children to be destroyed by. Treat John 
Barle3^corn the same way. Don’t let him lie around, licensed and legal, to 
pounce upon our youth.” 

If legalized saloons are at hand, with attractive show windows and in¬ 
viting open doors, a majority of the men of the vicinity patronize them, to 
the injury of their own health and character, and of the peace and good order 
of society. If saloons are closed, the majority quietly adapt themselves to 
the new situation, spend their time and money more wisely, and both they 
and their neighbors are better off. Few complain of the change; fewer still 
change their residence for that reason, and those that do are commercially 
and socially “ good riddance.” They carry abroad less money than they 
would be likely to draw later from the citizens as dependents, delinquents 
and defectives. 

To the man who says, right in the thick of a local no-license fight, that 
the State Legislature ought not to have given a town a chance to choose 
wrong, but should have put prohibition on the whole State, the answer is 
that whatever mistake the legislature may have made, the prohibition issue 
is up locally, and it can not be wrong to vote “ No ” when the question is 
officially presented to citizens, “ Shall saloons be licensed ? ” Indeed a citi¬ 
zen can not escape replying, for not to vote counts as “ Yes,” and may decide 
the issue. 

One Vote May Decide. 

Another thing should be “ shown ”—the responsibility of each voter, 
whether his vote is likely to decide the result or not. A MAN’S VOTE IS 
HIS SUPREME TESTIMONY AS A CITIZEN, and he is bound to give 
that testimony as much as to pray, and had better quit the mockery of pray¬ 
ing if he does not vote. Daniel Webster, asked what was the greatest 
thought that ever passed through his mind, replied with solemnity, “ THE 
THOUGHT OF MY INDIVIDUAL RESPONSIBILITY TO GOD.” That 
should be the ruling thought at the election season, especially as one vote 
has many times determined the result. Oliver Cromwell was elected by 
one vote, and changed the history of the world. If one of the farmers who 
voted for him had staid with his hogs that day, this country might have been 
a Mexico ready to welcome the Kaiser to this Continent instead of taking 
a hand in driving him from the earth. Rutherford B. Hayes was elected 
President by a majority of one in the electoral commission, and Oliver Mor¬ 
ton, Governor of Massachusetts, also by the same majority. New York 
State cast out gambling by the vote of Senator Foelker, brought in his sick 


90 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


chair at the risk of his life to vote. Btit where could he have found a better 
place to die? 

In Massachusetts more than a score of towns went " dry by one vote, 
or “ wet ” for lack of one. The writer has been at a town where the people 
pointed at a prominent church and said, There were enough voters in that 
church who did not vote to have saved us from having the saloons thrust 
back upon us.’* 

“ How did it happen ? ” asked a visitor to Riverside, California, when that 
town got back into the wet after being dry for many years. A David Harur. 
of the town answered, Four g’s did it—the gamblers, the greasers, the 
galoots, and some of the good.” Some of the good ** decide elections wrong 
by not voting at all. 

You ask how I think the no-license election is going. I think IT MAY 
CO DRY BY ONE VOTE—YOURS, OR THE VOTE YOU MAY WIN. 
IF YOU WILL. 

It should be said here for the sake of any who need the information, 
especially for Australasia, where a three-fourths vote is required on loca' 
prohibition (while one majority will elect a man to the highest office), that 
the benefits of prohibition come just the same in the Uinted States when 
there is a majority of one as when it is a thousand. No one is a good citizen, 
he is not even a good sport, who does not accept in good faith the result of 
a contest, however close, whether athletic or political. The man who is 
mean enough to be a bootlegger will be one no matter how large the majority. 
And as for the law enforcement officer, if he would be a perjurer, trampling 
on his oath, under a small majority, he would perjure himself under a large 
majority. Some of the cities that have held to the no-license policy longes: 
had a small majority at first. Cambridge, Massachusetts, seat of Harvard 
University, for example, dry by six majority the first time, has held to no¬ 
license a score of years without a single relapse. 

That some of the good ' may not help to turn the scale wrong by 
voting Yes or by not voting at all for lack of the arguments we might bring 
them, let us who believe the license policy both wicked and foolish get the 
issue clear and hot in our own hearts, and with our heads and hands full of 
proofs, wdn over not only the doubtful, but also the opposed. 

Keep National, State and Local Prohibition Unentangled. 

At the threshold of our subject there is need of caution to watch out 
against entangling four kinds of prohibition, all of which are up this year. 
1918 , and all of them in some States up at the same time. 

The aim of this brief is to present the case for no license, wholly separate 
from the arguments that are pertinent only to State or national prohibition. 
It is not pertinent to cite the working of State prohibition as an argument 
for or against town prohibition. The circumstances are quite different. 
Many local optionists are not State prohibitionists, and vice versa. Still more 
irrelevant in a local option campaign are arguments for or against national 
prohibition. And arguments for emergency war prohibition do not neces¬ 
sarily apply to any prohibition intended to outlast the war. On the other 
hand even if the National Government, by enacting war prohibition or by 
establishing a moral zone, has closed the local saloons for the period of the 


WHY NO LICENSE? 


91 


war, the citizens should vote no license lest the conclusion of the war should 
reopen saloons when industrial reconstruction makes saloon closing supremely 
important. 

Do Not Claim Too Much for No License. 

No license means exactly what it says. It does not mean, No liquors/'^ 
rhe sale of liquor^s for medical, sacramental and industrial purposes is not 
involved. Some may wish that it were, but the local referendum usually 
relates only to intoxicating beverages. It would be absured to assume that 
a vote for no license will bring absolute cessation at once even of the beverage 
use of alcohol. There is nothing to prevent drinkers laying in a stock before 
no license takes effect. And after that time there will still be some violations 
of this prohibition, just as there is of every other prohibition, else we should 
need no police or courts or jails. 

When the people vote to refuse liquor licenses they take away from 
liquor sellers all the advantages that go with a legal business, and put them 
into the same class as counterfeiters, burglars, body-snatchers, gunmen, 
gamblers and prostitutes. Under faithful executive officers none of these 
outlawed trades can do a tithe of the business it could do if legalized. Real 
estate dealers and advertising agents are all wrong if a man can “ sell 
as much ” from a hole im the wall ” down some blind alley, with the neces¬ 
sity of hiding his location instead of advertising it, as if he had a store with 
attractive show windows in the public square, and a page ad daily in the press. 

Let no one refuse to vote because there are blind tigers ” in some no 
license towns. If you as a father must choose for the sake of your children, 
in a case of real tigers, would you be more afraid of a blind tiger down 
some obscure alley, that bit no one who did not go there to be bitten, or of 
a hundred tigers with their eyes wide open on the principal streets under 
police protection, seeking whom they might devour? There need be no 
‘‘ blind tigers ” in a no license town if even one citizen will use the prohibition 
sword v/hich the law has provided to kill him. 

No License Banishes the Promoters of Drinking. 

The greatest benefit of no licnese is that it bars from local business the 
men would otherwise make their living by inducing other people to drink. 
NO LICENSE REMOVES THESE PROMOTERS OF DRINKING. 
NOT MUCH OF ANYTHING, GOOD OR BAD, IS DONE WITHOUT 
PROMOTERS. NEARLY ALL LAWS AGAINST VICE ARE DI¬ 
RECTED, NOT AGAINST THE CASUAL INDIVIDUAL OFFENDER, 
BUT AGAINST THE PROMOTERS OF VICE—THE PERSONS WHO 
MAKE IT THEIR BUSINESS TO INDUCE OTHERS TO GAMBLE, 
TO DRINK, TO PROSTITUTE THEIR VIRTUE. 

WHEN COMMERCIALIZED VICE IS LEGALIZED IT IS IN¬ 
EVITABLY LINKED UP IN AN UNHOLY LEAGUE WITPI COM¬ 
MERCIALIZED POLITICS, FOR IF LIQUOR DEALERS OR GAM¬ 
BLERS OR PROSTITUTES MUST HAVE AN ANNUAL LICENSE 
THEY WILL NECESSARILY SEEK TO CONTROL POLITICS EVERY 
YEAR. THE SUPREME PURPOSE OF NO LICENSE IS TO BREAK 
UP THAT UNHOLY LEAGUE OF VICES AND POLITICIANS, FOR 
THE LICENSED SALOONS’ CORRUPTION OF POLITICS IS A 
GREATER INJURY THAN EVEN THE HARM IT DOES TO THE 


92 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


DRINKER IN BODY AND SOUE, AND TO THE HOME AND TO 
BUSINESS. 

The Arguments for No License in Brief. 

The three chief arguments for no license are: first, the saloon is the 
despoiler of the home; second, the saloon is the enemy of verey honest busi¬ 
ness ; third and greatest—the patriotic argument—the saloon is the enemy 
of true democracy and civil liberty—a secret autocracy, whose aims are per¬ 
sonal, selfish, sensual, devilish. 

Manifestly, the attitude of the Sovereign People toward such a piratical 
trade should be not one of sanction but of hostility, regardless of whether 
it can be fully destroyed. It will be easier to educate the people to destroy 
it when it has been branded by the people’s ballots as an enemy of society. 

All we can fairly be required to prove as a reason why citizens should 
vote no license is: first, that the liquor traffic, as found in real life, is harmful; 
second, that no license reduces the harm much more than the so-called 
restrictions ” of the alternative license system. 

The Only Good Element in License Laws. 

Every license law has some prohibition in it, and is “ so far, so good.” 
Usually a license law prohibits selling liquor on Sundays, and in many cases 
on holidays—because liquor and leisure never meet but for mischief. Usually 
there are prohibitions of selling before and after certain hours each day; 
prohibition also of selling to minors and to drunkards. But these partial 
prohibitions do little good, partly because it is very difficult to watch the 
conduct of a multitude of saloons. Those who manage them, as we shall 
show, habitually disregard the restrictions written in the laws. Further¬ 
more, when a majority of the citizens of a town vote to license saloons, that 
majority cares very little whether the restrictions are enforced. They are 
put into the law mainly to win the votes of “ some of the good ” with the 
idea that the evils of the saloon are to be reduced to their lowest terms. It 
would very much shock some pious license voters if they were asked to vote, 
not for the theoretic saloon as described in the law, but for the real American 
saloon and bar room as described by character witnesses we shall now call.” 

The Liquor Business Painted by Itself. 

We will first quote the damning confessions that saloonists themselves 
have uttered when “ reform waves ” have made the devil so seasick that he 
thought he would die, and at such hours the devil a monk would be.” In 
those sick moments, liquor sellers, and especially liquor papers, often preach 
plainly to their fellows of their mutual sins, and urge repentence to save the 
trade from the wrath to come. 

We subjoin a few of these saloon portraits painted by themselves as 
unbiased proof that the saloons are not fit to live. They have not heeded 
these urgent calls from their own leaders to reform. '' The Model License 
League ” has been sending out its prospectus for many years, but has no 
line of samples to show. The writer has courteously asked its President, 
Mr. T. M. Gilmore, to name even a score of saloons in the whole country 
with a clean record, and although Mr. Gilmore has answered other letters, 
no reply comes to this request to be shown ” some results from the numer¬ 
ous specific efforts of liquor associations to clean house. THE SALOON 
CAN NOT BE MENDED, AND SO SHOULD BE ENDED. 



WHY NO LICENSE? 


93 


Americans Treat Wine, Whiskey and Beer as Brothers. 

Before quoting the saloon portraits by its own hand, it should be noted 
mainly for the benefit of foreign readers that when Americans (except Hearst 
“ Americans ”) speak of “ saloons ” or “ Drink '' or Booze,’' they include 
all the Booze Brothers (we name by seniority). Wine, Whiskey, and Beer. 
Saloonists and prohibitionists alike in the United States are accustomed to 
speak of the liquor traffic with no distinction between drinks that stand 
together behind the bar and on the bar, and work the same sort of mischief 
in front of the bar. Americans reached in 1836 the point Europe seems 
unlikely to reach before 1936, that alcohol whether in whiskey, wine, or beer, 
will do the same deadly and devilish work. There is about the same amount 
of alcohol, one and one-fourth ounces, in three ounces of 42% whiskey, one 
half pint of 16% wine, one pint of 8% ale, or three pints of 3 per cent war beer. 

It is not alone the alcohol but also the saloon atmosphere of profanity, 
impurity and anarchy, that is considered both in the confessions of the friends 
of the saloon and the condemnations of its foes. The saloon is the nest 
where all evil birds flock together. 

Liquor Papers At the Confessional . 

The New York Wine and Spirit Gazette, August 25, 1902, said, edi¬ 
torially : The saloon as conducted is a nuisance and a loafing place for the 
idle and vicious. It is generally on a prominent street and is usually run 
by a sport who cares only for the almighty dollar. From this resort the 
drunken man starts reeling home. At this resort the local fights are indulged 
in. It is a stench in the nostrils of society and a disgrace to the wine and 
spirit trade.” 

Here is a similar portrait of the saloon by itself that appeared in the 
Wholesalers and Retailers’ Review, San Francisco, September, 1907: “ Any 
man who knows the saloon well can honestly say that most of them have for¬ 
feited their right to live. The model saloon exists chiefly in the minds of the 
editors of liquor journals, in the imaginations of a certain type of ministers, 
and in the mythical stories sometimes rehearsed at saloonmen’s campfires. 
Unfortunately the average tippling house is a place of ill fame, a place of 
debauchery. With comparatively few exceptions, our saloons are houses of 
drunken men, profanity and obscenity of the vilest possible type.” 

The Champion of Fair Play, Chicago, June 7, 1902, gives this picture of 
the saloon in an appeal for members made by the Liquor Dealers’ State 
Protective Association: “ The laws of this state governing the liquor trade 
are so severe that there is not a licensed saloon keeper in Illinois that does 
not lay himself liable to prosecution under the law a dozn times a day.” (The 
Champion in 1918 showed that in Illinois the U. S. Government collects a tax 
from 22,149 retail liquor dealers ”—while the several municipalities through¬ 
out the state licensed only 11,013 retail liquor dealers, showing that more 
than one-half (11,136) are selling illegally.) 

The Brewer’s Journal, September, 1916, openly declared the contempt 
of the liquor dealers for laws: ‘ A perfect stranger ’ writes three long col¬ 

umns in the Detroit ' Saturday Night ’ to show that saloons are open in 
Detroit on Sundays. [This was before prohibition came.] What a waste of 
time, paper, and ink! Everybody knows that in our large American cities, 
the centers of learning, industry, finance, fashion and intelligence, the in¬ 
habitants care not for ' laws ’ made by time-serving politicians, at the behest 


04 


bRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


of economicaily and intellectually limited theologians and their few and 
misled followers! 

The Brewers’ Journal, July, 1D18, makes a surprisingly frank admission 
of the barefaced ” violations of law by saloons selling intoxicants to our 
fighting men that lie back of the orders of Secretary Daniels establishing five- 
mile dry zones around naval stations in Newport, Annapolis, and other places, 
and similar zones established for like reasons about Army camps, which was 
done in each case only after vain appeals of the government to the saloons 
to co-operate patriotically with the Government in preventing illegal sales of 
liquors to men in uniform. (See p. 21.) 

The Liquor Dealers’ Defense. 

It should be said frankly that liquor advocates plead in abatement of 
these confessions that it should be remembered there are ‘‘ bad men in all 
professions and occupations ”—bad preachers, as well as good; bad doctors, 
bad lawyers, bad bankers. But let them show some recognized organ of 
these callings, or some leaders among them that speak of their whole tribe as 
the liquor leaders we have quoted speak of their business. In no other 
legalized occupation do its leaders admit that lawbreaking is the rule—not 
merely the exception. Some liquor men urge that some saloons are no worse 
than this club ” or that; which does not help the case, for many clubs are 
only camouflaged saloons, established for drinking at hours when saloons 
are closed. 

More States Evidence. 

It would seem that no further evidence is necessary when so many 
saloonists have admitted the habitual guilt of the trade. But because the 
drink habit in some persons, and drink revenue and profits in the case of 
others, blinds the reason, we shall add further testimony from saloonists 
and others, enough to convince every doubter who will read the proofs with 
open mind. 

An amazing confession bearing on the menace of drink to industrial 
efficiency, published in Brewers’ Journal, March, 1918, pp. 182-3, in stafi: 
correspondence from Continental Europe, is as follows: 

“The government committee on manual labor in France recently re¬ 
ported that the question of alcoholism is becoming of almost vital importance, 
as reliable reports indicate that a large percentage of absence from work is 
due to the use of intoxicating liquor; that in the coal mines, at the time the 
report was submitted, absences amounted to 13 or 14 per cent, of possible 
days of labor, and that this was largely due to intemperance,. It is estimated 
that coal production is decreased for this reason alone by 5 per cent. It is 
said, ‘ The day that liquor traffic is regulated in mining centers then will the 
question of absence from work be solved/ There is not an industry which 
has not been compelled to report the, effects of liquor drinking on production. 

‘ Women seem to be particularly affected. Brought into new surroundings, 
and influenced by unaccustomed conditions,, they more readily fall into 
temptations/ Recognizing the menace to national industry, the State has 
attempted, through orders issued by local and military authority, to interdict 
the sale of alcohol in various districts. The restrictions so ordered have in 
some cases met with such strong protest that important modifications per¬ 
mitting the sale in determined hours only have been made. Certain com¬ 
manding generals have issued orders forbidding the sale to mobilized 


WIIV XO LI 


CEX>F," 9r, 

iaborers, women, and colonial and foreign laborers. The use of intoxicating 
liquors as a beverage is a cause of deep concern with the War Office. The 
minister of munitions addressing the labor controllers said, ‘ While there is 
no penalty provided by law which seems efficacious against the pernicious 
influence of places where liquors are dispensed, yet the state of war provides 
measures which no one in authority should hesitate to employ, i. e., the clos¬ 
ing of such places as are convicted of contravention.’ The controllers are 
required to report to the minister all cases where abuse is noticed, and to call 
upon military authority to immediately close the offending selling place.” 

Wholesalers of Liquors as Bad as Saloons. 

Sometimes local option laws give a town no control over the local manu- 
‘cicture and wholesaling of liquors, but when they do, distillers, brewers and 
wholesalers should go wdth the saloons into the discard as no whit better 
than the retailers, despite their wealth and fine houses. The evidence show\s 
them to be wdiolesale lawbreakers. 

That the big brewers, for example, are no better than the saloons, wffiich 
they mostly own, was proved when in response to decoy letters from Presi¬ 
dent Samuel Dickie, the five chief brewers of Milwaukee all wrote letters 
saying they would ship beer in disguise to unlicensed and lawbreaking dealers 
in dry ” territory. 

Speaking before the eighth annual convention of the Wisconsin Retail 
Liquor Dealers’ Protective Association, in July, 1913, P. H. Nolan, national 
’>rganizer of that body, bitterly assailed the brew’ers as lawbreakers in these 
and other frank words: “ I say that the brewers of this State have for years 

sold their goods to unlicensed and disreputable resorts. They have injured 
the business of men who try to conduct it according to law.” (Mr, Arthur 
Burrage Farwelk president of Chicago Law and Order League, in a letter 
dated July 31, 1918, said: In 1911 we investigated ten of the worst saloons 
in one of the red light districts of Chicago and found in every instance that 
the bondsmen were brewers or their employees.”) 

The American Brewer, May, 1907, said: Practically all the fixtures of 
every saloon in Kansas [a prohibition state] are owned by the brewers 
[outside of Kansas] which also owns a large amount of real estate used for 
saloon purposes.” 

The Brewers even cite this persistent lawlessness of theirs and their 
local pals and agents as a reason why lawless speakeasies should be legal¬ 
ized. It is rather the chief reason why the w’hole business should be ban¬ 
ished from the earth as hopelessly lawless. 

Adolph Keitel, malster, of 18 Broadway, New York, in 1914, sent out 
a circular letter to the brewing trade. It was meant to boost the business 
of beer and tell brewers how they could keep their business in operation 
longer than ten years. As a statement of things as they are we do not know 
its equal for frankness from any liquor source. We need to keep in mind 
as we read that this is from no prohibition advocate, but from a malster 
and a man who would make breweries and beer a permanent part of Amer¬ 
ican life. We print the most pertinent parts of the letter with capitalizations 
and black-faced type just as they occur in the original. Mr. Keitel, speak¬ 
ing to the brewers, says: 


96 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


‘‘Judging from what information I have been able to gather during 
the past four or five weeks, I predict that, unless there is a radical change 
in the disgraceful manner in which the liquor traffic is conducted today, the 
fast growing prohibition and woman suffrage movement v/ill strike the death¬ 
blow to your industry and that WITHIN TEN YEARS FROM NOW NO 
BREWERIES WILL BE IN OPERATION, EXCEPT IN A VERY FEW 
LARGE CITIES. 

“ There is no denying the fact that your ‘ friends,’ the malting interests, 
stirred up the ‘ hornet’s nest ’ when, a few years ago, they sent a representa¬ 
tive to Washington, disguised as a farmer, to prove to the pure food branch 
of the Department of Agriculture that the product of many breweries has, by 
the use of substitutes, drugs and chemicals, been adulterated to such an ex¬ 
tent that it has become a menace to the health of the public. 

“HOW CAN YOU EXPECT TO FIGHT YOUR ENEMIES SUC¬ 
CESSFULLY AS LONG AS YOU HAVE THE IDEA THAT YOU CAN 
FOOL THE PEOPLE? 

“ Is it not a notorious fact that a number of those very breweries who 
have in the recent past claimed through public speeches and through the 
press that they have mended their ways by shutting down on disreputable 
and disorderly places, are the gratest offenders, and continue, without asking 
any question, to deliver their product daily to houses of prostitution and 
other dives—in fact, to anybody who has the price? 

“ Is it not a fact that many hotels and other property owned by brewers 
are run, with their knowledge, for disorderly purposes? 

“ I can cite instances where representatives of breweries or managers of 
their branches were not only openly abetting, but actually operated them¬ 
selves, houses of prostitution, and were even engaged in white slave traffic. 
I can also cite instances where breweries and individuals connected with 
breweries have operated gambling houses, and other instances where notori¬ 
ous gamblers are the principal owners of breweries. 

“ Two Sundays ago I had occasion to make a call on some one residing 
in a block known as one of the most exclusive residential districts in this 
city. The only eyesore in the block is the side entrance to a large saloon. 
My attention was called to the stream of drunken hoodlums, as well as un¬ 
escorted dissolute women, who were constantly entering or leaving the place. 

“ RESPECTABLE CITIZENS BELIEVE, AND JUSTLY SO, THAT 
THE BREWER WHOSE SIGN IS DISPLAYED PROMINENTLY IN 
FRONT OF THE DIVES, AND WHO FREQUENTLY OWNS THE 
PROPERTY, IS THE REAL OFFENDER. 

“ There is iust one way open for you to successfully fight the situation: 
COMPLY WITH THE LAW AND MAKE ALL YOUR CUSTOMERS 
COMPLY WITH THE LAW. Close up their saloons by refusing to fur¬ 
ther supply them with beer, if they do not heed your first warning. WOULD 
NOT A SLIGHT DECREASE IN YOUR ANNUAL BEER SALES BE 
INFINITELY BETTER THAN TO BE DRIVEN OUT OF BUSINESS 
AND LOSING YOUR ENTIRE INVESTMENT? 

“ When a new customer conies to you, change your first question, ‘ How 
much beer do you sell? ’ to ‘ WHAT KIND OF A PLACE DO YOU RUN? ’ 

“ I want to help you all I can to elevate your great industry to such an 
extent that you will gain the respect of the community, such as brewers en¬ 
joy in European countries.” 


WHY NO LICENSE? 


97 


The foregoing quotations are all portraits of the saloon by itself—like a 
Rembrandt by Rembrandt—or it would be fitting to quote the ignorant word of a 
“ quick-rich woman—by “ Remnants.” 

We will call yet another liquor witness, The Wholesale Liquor Business 
impersonated as a single offender. Let us cross-question the witness: 

Prosecutor. You are accustomed to say, “ Prohibition don’t prohibit.” Do 
you mean by that that when the people of a city or State, by the regular processes 
of democracy, for which the best nations in the world are fighting, have regularly 
prohibited the sale of liquors, the Wholesale Liquor Business persistently ship 
liquors to lawbreaking speakeasies and bootleggers of those places? 

Wholesale Liquor Business. We ship liquors to anybody who will pay for 
the goods if there is any way to get them there. 

Prosecutor. Are there any brewers or distillers or wholesale liquor sellers 
that refuse to ship liquors to unlicensed dealers? 

Wholesale Liquor Business. None. 

Prosecutor. Then the common talk about the liquors sold in “ dry ” places 
being of a different and worse quality than those sold in license states is false. 

Wholesale Liquor Business. We sell the same kinds and all kinds in dry 
places as in wet. 

Prosecutor. In Maine you argued for local option as against States prohibi¬ 
tion because each town, you said, should decide for itself; but in Massachusetts 
did you respect the “ home rule ” decisions made in no license votes, and refuse 
to sell to unlicensed dealers in dry towns? 

Wholesale Liquor Business. We sold to anybody who would buy, law or 
no law. 

Prosecutor. Then I charge that you are an anarchist, a traitor to the 
fundamental principle of democracy, majority rule; and that every red- 
blooded patriot should vote you off the earth, not alone, because you poison 
the individual and ruin the home and disturb the city, but most of all because 
of your habitual lawlessness, which is a fundamental crime against civiliza¬ 
tion. The citizen of no license towns pusilanimously permit you to sell be¬ 
cause you come at them with a threat and a bribe. “ We will sell anyway,” 
you say, “ and you might as well take our license fee and make the best of 
it.” Those who surrender to your threat and bribe, though opposed to the 
Drink, are commercialized cowards, unfit to live in this day of heroism, when 
men are dying to defend law against those who regard all law, divine and 
human, as but “ a scrap of paper.” 

The foregoing impersonation is no imaginary picture; e. g., Boston’s whole¬ 
sale liquor business, which is the senior anarchist of the liquor trade, has associated 
with speakeasies nearly three score years and ten. It is doomed to die before it 
reaches that age by federal execution unless Boston or Massachusetts can be 
roused to honor itself by striking down this defiant lawbreaker before national 
constitutional prohibition is accomplished. 

In 1916 - 17 , Henry N. Pringle, Assistant Superintendent of the International 
Reform Bureau, investigated, with the aid of the detectives, the speakeasy trade 


98 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


of Boston^s wholesale liquor dealers, including brewers and distillers. In the 
chart are shown in circles the towns and the number of speak-easies in each to 
which these “ respectableliquor dealers shipped liquors by illegal pony ex¬ 
presses, whose crimes are shown in photographs. 


One of many incidents showing how dry towns are invaded by liquor in¬ 
terests was brought out in a letter from Duluth to Senator Nelson, which was 
turned over to Senator Lenroot and by the latter read to the U. S. Senate on 
August 29 , 1918 : 

“ As you well know, Duluth went dry a year ago this month and I can not 
tell you how well pleased we were, and how clean our city has been ever since. 
Our trouble then started when Superior would go dry, and thank the Lord it did 
go dry on July 1 , 1918 . Then came one or two liquor dealers and organized the 
township of Oliver, in Wisconsin, and got a few voters in there in order to vote 
for the license and defy the State of Wisconsin, as well as the State of Minnesota, 
in giving licenses to one retail liquor dealer and seven wholesale houses. These 
seven wholesale liquor houses do in reality a retail business, for they sell from 
one pint to a gallon of liquor. I visited this place about three weeks ago. I 
found that the one saloon was a very large building, jammed to the door, with 
eight or ten bartenders, with men struggling to the bar to get a drink, and several 
busses running from the steel plant to the village and the saloon. The seven 
wholesale liquor houses were not permitted to engage in business as a saloon, 
but regarding it as a wholesale liquor business were selling beer in pint bottles 
and whiskey in half-pint bottles. That is a condition that we have within the 
very short distance of plants engaged in war work employing several thousand 
men.” 

A special resolution was passed unanimously in Congress to enable the Sec¬ 
retary of War to suppress this robber den of drink because munition work was 
hindered, but there are many such lawless barrooms preying on soldiers and 
citizens both in violation of dry laws and under permission of lawless license 
laws, and only nation-wide prohibition can stamp them out fully. 


Not alone the liquor dealers but city and even State officials are involved in 
the guilt of this headquarters of lawlessness—Boston citizens also so far as they 
have not voted to banish these lawbreakers. This picture of Boston as a tolerated 
crime-center reminds us of the robbers’ den in Lorna Doone, and the robber 
chief bringing home a girl strapped like a rabit to his saddle. Thousands of boys 
and girls has Boston destroyed, not alone by legalized sales of liquors in the 
city, but also by Boston’s lawless traffic all over New England. 

Let no one fear we are admitting too much when we point out the speak¬ 
easies in dry towns, partly to arouse sleeping citizens, but chiefly in this case 
to show that the liquor business, from brewer to bootlegger, is an anarchist and 
so not fit to live. 


How Prohibition Prohibits. 

As to the saying, “ Prohibition don’t prohibit,” it is self-evident liquor 
dealers would be profoundly still about it if it were so, as in that case they 
could save their license fees with no loss of trade. The liquor magazines 
are full of alarmed declarations of the effectiveness of prohibition in all its 
forms in reducing their trade where it is in force. The only weight the saying 
Prohibition don’t prohibit” has is due to the assumption of the liquor 



WHY NO LICENSE? 


99 


people, which some good but unthinking people accept, that the prohibition 
of the liquor traffic, unlike the prohibition of murder, theft, false witness, 
and ernbezzlement, is a failure if it does not instantly annihilate the evil at 
which it is aimed. Like all other prohibitions from Eden down to the present, 
liquor prohibition is violated. But like all prohibitions of real evils it is a 
success in that it outlaws a wrong and reduces it. 

To prove that the per capita liquor consumption in the country at large 
has not decreased in proportion to the increase of prohibition areas does not 
prove the ineffectiveness of prohibition in its own areas. The increase is in 
wet areas, chiefly in our big wet cities, with their millions of foreign work¬ 
ingmen, whose higher wages and shorter hours naturally result in greatly 
. increased drinking. 

Only Partial Prohibition Possible Before the “ Bone Dry ” Era. 

We have hurt our cause by creating expectations that are not likely 
to be realized under the limitations of local option, especially in these days of 
easy transit from dry to wet areas by trolley and auto. There should be no 
hesitation in saying that no reasonable man ever expected prohibition of any 
kind, previous to the “ bone dryera, would stop all consumption of alcoholic 
beverages in dry territory. Down to 1917, it was legal, under the Supreme 
Court interpretation of interstate commerce rights, for any one in dry terri¬ 
tory to import liquors “ for personal use ” in spite of anything State or town 
might vote. That accounted for much consumption in dry places within the 
law, and made it all too easy to sell on the sly some of the liquor so imported. 

But even the figures published in liquor papers as to liquors sent into 
dry territory, the writer has shown elsewhere (see p. 5), prove liquor con¬ 
sumption in dry territory to be less than a tithe of the consumption in wet 
territory. In the case of local prohibition we can not reasonably expect so 
great a reduction. 

It is pertinent to quote here the frank statement of an inspector in Kavai, 
Hawaii, when a very weak form of no license forbade only the retail sale. 
Wholesalers might both sell and solicit on their premises, and deliver but not 
solicit elsewhere. This is what he said: 

‘‘ Anybody who really wanted liquor could get it. But there was very 
little drunkenness. People had to seek the liquor instead of the liquor seek¬ 
ing them. The demand was not artificially stimulated and increased. There 
was enough danger in the illicit business to keep it down to moderate limits. 
There was not enough money in it to make it a factor in politics. In those 
days, as near as can be estimated, there was about $40,000 a year spent in 
liquor on this islafld, as against $260,000 that we knov*^ of during last year 
(under full license).'' 

Why Many Drinking Men Would Prohibit Saloons. 

In a concert hall in the city of Buffalo, Kipling saw two young men get two 
young girls drunk and then lead them reeling down a dark street. Mr. Kipling 
has not been a total abstainer nor have his writings commended temperance, but 
of that scene he writes: “ Then recanting previous opinions, I became a prohibi¬ 
tionist. Better it is that a man should go without his beer in public places, and 
content himself with swearing at the narrow-mindedness of the majority; better 
it is to poison the inside with very vile temperance drinks, and to buy lager 
furtively at back doors, than to bring temptation to the lips of young fools such 
as the four I had seen. I understand now why the preachers rage against drink. 


100 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


I have said: ‘ There is no harm in it, taken moderately; ’ and yet my own demand 
for beer helped directly to send these two girls reeling down the dark street to— 
God alone knows what end. If liquor is worth drinking, it is worth taking a 
little trouble to come at—such as a man will undergo to compass his own desires. 
It is not good that we should let it lie before the eyes of children, and I have 
been a fool in writing to the contrary.” 

The reduction of arrests by a change from wet to dry is usually about two- 
thirds. If drink and its consequences are reduced one-third, it is well worth 
while, and so much is possible in a dry town even though it is morally an 
island with wet environments on every side. 

Anti-Alcohol Campaign Should Follow Anti-Saloon Campaign. 

It might be nine-tenths if the ‘‘anti-saloon campaign” were vigorously fol- ' 
lowed up, as Miss Willard suggested, with “ an anti-alcohol campaign.” 

Even while a local option campaign is on, and still more when victory is 
won, there is a feeling of disappointment on the part of some temperance radicals 
and even of some merchants who desire to turn to their own useful traffics the 
money that is worse than wasted in drink shops, because local option usually does 
not, either in theory or practice, stop all the purchasing of intoxicants. 

It should be distinctly recognized that there are two campaigns to be 

FOUGHT : THE FIRST FOR THE ABOLITION BY LAW OF LOCAL INCICTMENTS TO DRINK, 
THAT IS, OF ALL LIQUOR SELLING; TLIE SECOND, FOR THE INCREASE OF PERSONAL 
ABSTINENCE, WHICH IS TO BE SECURED BY ARGUMENT. When law has made it 
harder to drink and easier to abstain, we should “ seize the hour ” to press the 
total abstinence argument, not only for the general good of the individual and the 
community, but also to fortify and maintain no license, which is very likely to be 
lost at a subsequent election if the waste of money in drink has not been ma¬ 
terially diminished, for in that case it means the purchases and profit are trans¬ 
ferred to the next town. It is a supreme mistake for temperance forces to relax 
their campaigning when no license has been voted. It is like the mistake of 
saying, “ The sermon is done,” when it is only preached and has not yet been 
“ done ” in real life. The no license law needs a campaign of education not 
only to secure its enactment but also its faithful enforcement; and still more to 
insure its continuance; and most of all to secure the general abstinence which 
is the final goal to which science and religion and patriotism all summon us. 

Testimony of Labor Leaders. 

From this comment on the liquor sellers testimony we return to our waiting 
witnesses. Next to the testimony of the leaders of those who sell the liquors, the 
testirnony of the leaders of those who do the major part of the buying and 
drinking—the workingmen—should be most significant. First, we call John 
Mitchell, who showed himself the real chief of American labor, who ever may 
bear the title, when he more than held his own in the coal arbitration ordered 
by President Roosevelt, though the masters of capitalism were pitted against 
him. At this writing he is Vice President of the American Federation of Labor. 
Hear him: 

“ I have no sympathy with the statement, so often made, that the manufacture and 
sale of liquor has contributed to the industrial development of the nation. On the con¬ 
trary, I believe that liquor has contributed more to the moral, intellectual and material 
deterioration of the people, and has brought more misery to defenseless women and 
children than has any other agency to the history of mankind. The man who drinks 
to excess is not regarded by his employer as the proper person to kold a responsible 
position. A strong man is controlled by this appetite as well as a weak one The 
men who think they can take a drink and then stop, end as drunkards. I am against 


WHY NO LICENSE? 


101 


the saloons because they are against my people, and I am more than willing to antago¬ 
nize thern. On pay day the saloonkeepers are like tigers. My men enter their resorts 
with their wages, and often leave with nothing, and then it falls on the wife to pacify 
the storekeeper on the non-payment of the bills, and the family is left pracitcally 
destitute.” 

The three following labor leaders are quoted by the Minnesota Anti-Saloon 
League: 

John W. Kline, President Internation.il Brotherhood of Blacksmiths and Helpers: 
“ The devil never established a business that is more deceptive than the saloon business. 
The bar-room is a recruiting station for every form of evil. The brain, befuddled with 
booze, disqualifies a man for transacting business. Bar-room demagogues have caused 
the loss of life, property and public confidence, and many times have brought defeat 
to the cause of labor.” 

R. F. Travelick, President of National Eight-Hour League: “The use of liquor 
and its influences have done more to darken labor’s homes, dwarf its energies and 
chain it hand and foot to the wheels of corporate aggression than all other influences 
combined.” 

James Simpson, Delegate American Federation of Labor: “ Labor leaders are alive 
to the menace that the saloon is to the progress of workingmen. When the Toronto 
Labor Temple was founded a clause was put in its constitution totally excluding in¬ 
toxicating liquor from the premises.” 

Next we call one who for many years was the treasurer of the American 
Federation of Labor, Mr. John B. Lennon: 

“ Organized Labor stands for compulsory education, but the saloon stands for 
Ignorance and degradation. The purpose of the trade Union is to raise the standard 
of living. What about the saloon? Is there a man who will dare to say there is any 
influence of the saloon except to lower this standard and make men less manly and 
women less womanly? I do not know a solitary principle for which the labor move¬ 
ment stands but that the saloon is on the other side of the question. Who can deny 
that the liquor traffic is driving men and women to work in factories, workshops, and 
washtubs who ought not to be there, and boys and girls into industrial life who should 
be in the school or on the playground? The liquor traffic tends to decrease wages, 
never to increase them. The use of alcohol makes men less skilful and drives men to 
lower scales of employment and reward. Every cent spent in the liquor business is 
wasted. There is no redeeming feature in the saloon. Go anywhere where its in¬ 
fluence is felt and you see the demoralization it brings. We are fighting for social 
well-being, civic benefit and moral uplift. Never a foul plot is organized to injure 
public rights and social wellbeing but the saloon is used for the job. I have been 
criticized for my fight against the saloon, but I give notice here and now that I will 
fight the traffic as long as there is a saloon left.” 

Let us also hear one who has put more idealism into labor reform than its 
rank and file can yet appreciate, Hon. Terence V. Powderly, ex-Grand Master 
Workman, Knights of Labor: 

“ I know I am right. I know that, in refusing to even touch a drop of strong 
drink, I was and am right. In refusing to treat another to that which I do not believe 
to be good for myself to drink, I know that I am right. In not allowing a rumseller 
to gain admittance into the order of the Knights of Labor, I know I am right. In 
advising our assemblies not to rent halls or meeting-rooms over drinking places, I 
know that I am right. I have done this from the day my voice was first heard in the 
council halls of our order. My position on the question of temperance is right. ^ I am 
determined to maintain it, and will not alter it one jot or tittle. I know that in the 
organization of which I am the heard there are many good men who drink, but they 
would be better men if they did not drink. What have the saloons ever done for hu¬ 
manity? How many souls have they saved? How many people have they clothed, 
except the saloon-keeper’s family? When the men have a strike, the saloon-keeper 
often contributes more than the dry goods man, but he robs them of more. I never 
knew one of them to give a cent that he did not expect a dollar in return. The liquor 
traffic is responsible for nine-tenths of the miseries among the working classes, and the 
abolition of that traffic would be the greatest blessing that could come to them.” 


102 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


These testimonies of labor leaders more than offset the championship of the 
saloon by Samuel Gompers, President of the American Federation of Labor, 
who himself tells us twice over that he has no mandate from the Federation to 
speak against prohibition.’^' P. M. Arthur, when Chief of the Brotherhood of 
Locomotive Engineers, said: “If I could I would inaugurate a strike that 
would drive the liquor traffic from the face of the earth.” W. D. Ryan, when 
Illinois Secretary of the United Mine Workers of America, said: “If laboring 
men would abstain from liquor they would free themselves from 90 per cent, 
of their hardship.” John Burns, member of the British Parliament, united 
with 139 other labor leaders in 1893 in saying: “ The dptruction of the poor is 
their poverty, and the present licensing system is the chief cause of the present¬ 
time poverty, debasement, and weakness of the poor.” 

The President of the National Temperance Federation of England said in 
1918 : “It is very encouraging to know that the [British^ Labor Party is in 
favor of giving the people the power to determine by their votes in every locality 
whether the common sale of intoxicating drinks shall he permitted or not, and 
that many of the most influential members of the party are in favor of national 
prohibition, at least during the war and demobilization.” 

This is the voice of that British Labor Union of manual and intellectual 
workers that have excelled both Lloyd George and President Wilson in present¬ 
ing a practical detailed scheme of the new world of fraternal democracies that 
should be realized through the world war. 

“ Workingmen may talk of the robberies by the trusts, but the trusts take 
the cash and leave the man. Liquor takes the cash, and takes the man. It robs 
the pocket of dimes and dollars; it robs the heart of love, the brain of intelligence, 
and the conscience of honor. It steals the health, and weakens the will, and 
blackens the reputation, and blasts the hope of the man. We can liken a 
working man weighted down with the drink habit to nothing so much as an 
animal dragging himself along whose back has been broken by a wagon 
wheel. How can such men, crippled as they must be in intelligence and 
morals and self-control, form effective labor unions? Hov/, with their earn¬ 
ings gone into the brewer’s dividends, can they outstand capital in a long 
siege? ” 

What Roman Catholic Leaders Say of Liquor Traffic. 

As the majority of saloon patrons in the United States are of foreign birth 
or ancestry, they are naturally found to a larger extent in the Catholic Church 
than in any other. Its people are mostly from countries to which “ the arrest of 
thought has not come ” as to the harmfulness of the drink traffic and the drink 
habit. Roman Catholic pastors therefore are expert witnesses as to the influence 
of the saloon upon its patrons. Some few of the Catholic prelates have come out 
in opposition to .state and national prohibition, but the testimony of most of its 
leaders, lay and clerical, is that the saloon, the barroom, the liquor traffic, is a 
harmful institution, and should be suppressed by law wherever public sentiment 
is intelligent enough to do it. Note that it is not whiskey or any particular in¬ 
toxicant which they condemn, but demand suppression of the whole liquor traffic. 

Third Council of Baltimore, 1884 : We call upon all pastors to induce those 
of their flocks that may be engaged in the sale of liquors to quit the dangerous 
traffic as soon as possible, and to make their living in some more honorable way. 

Cardinal Manning: The drink traffic is a public, permanent, and ubiquitous 
agency of degradation. The drink trade is our shame, scandal, and sin, and 


* See pp. 35-37 for full discussion of his efforts in defense of saloons. 



WHY NO LICENSE? 


103 


unless brought under by the will of the people, it will be our downfall. * ^ * 
Do you know how you will help to break up the unholy alliance between Govern¬ 
ment and the greatest fraud of the age? Vote against it. 

Archbishop Ireland: Education, the elevation of the masses, liberty, all 
that the age admires—is set at naught by this dreadful evil. The individual 
conscience is the first arm in opposing it, but the individual conscience has to 
be strengthened and supplemented by law. The claim of saloon keepers to free¬ 
dom in their traffic is the claim to spread disease, sin, and pauperism. Would 
God place in my hand a wand with which to dispel the evil of intemperance, I 
would strike the door of every saloon, every distillery, of every brewery, until 
the accursed traffic should be wiped from the face of the earth. 

Archbishop John /. Keane: If I could cause the earth to open and swallow 
up every saloon in the world, I would feel that I was doing humanity a blessing. 
The saloon is bad for the home, the church and the country. It has no redeem¬ 
ing feature. No wonder the bishops of the Third Council of Baltimore anathema¬ 
tized it. And if any man praise it, if any man countenance or encourage it, does 
he not deserve to share in the anathema? 

Archbishop Spaulding: Whatever restrictions may be thrown around its 
management, the American saloon is and must continue to be so long as it shall 
be tolerated, a nuisance. To license is in a way to approve, and a wise and good 
man can not approve the liquor traffic. As to the right of the State to prohibit, 
there can be no question, since the right to suppress crime involves the right to 
suppress its chief cause. 

Archbishop Gross: The saloons in all English-speaking cunnirieshave be¬ 
come hell holes of iniquity. Not being able to improve them, I would stamp 
them out entirely. 

Archbishop Bruchesi: All agree that alcohol is a poison, and one which 
kills. Why then should we have establishments where such poison is dispensed 
to the public? There is absolutely no reason for a single barroom in Montreal. 

Bishop Loras, 1855 : “ We request you also, sir, for the interest of our holy 

religion and for the temporal and eternal welfare of our Catholic people, for 
whom you will have to answer at the bar of the tribunal of God, to use publicly 
and privately all arguments in your power to persuade them to vote on the first 
Monday of next April in favor of the Iowa Liquor Law.” 

Bishop A. P. Doyle: The saloon has become the germ centre of lawless¬ 
ness. While it debauches some of the people with drunkenness, and takes 
from them the knowldege necessary for an intelligent ballot, it snaps its 
fingers at the law made for its restriction. It has become an unscrupulous 
and conscienceless tyrant of American politics. 

Bishop Conaty: Where saloons are licensed, how many live up to the law? 
Not one. Vested rights! Has the community no rights? There is no reason 
for the existence of saloons. Blot them all out and what harm? 

Father O'Callaghan: The Church is against the saloon. The saloon is 
against the Church. 

Father F. A. Cunningham: What is the duty of eveiy Catholic voter this 
year? Can he conscientiously cast his vote for the support of a license con¬ 
demned by the Councils, prelates and supreme pontiff of his church ? How can 
he dare to walk deliberately to the voting place and sign the deed which shall 
deliver his city into the hands of her enemies? No Catholic should vote or in¬ 
fluence a vote for license. In doing so he would be false to the spirit of his 


104 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


church—he would be a scandal to a non-Catholic who might point to him as a 
product of Catholic education—he would act the part of a Benedict Arnold in 
signing the betrayal of his city. 

Father George Zurcher, President Catholic Prohibition League: Instead 
of being licensed, the alcoholic business, like any other pestilence, ought to be 
quarantined. Entrenched behind appetite, tradition, habit and law, this great 
fraud of the ages has dared to proclaim itself the guardian of personal liberty; 
but the mask no longer conceals this cruel vampire which has sucked every 
moral issue from our politics—municipal. State and national. 

Father Walter Shanley: The liquor traffic is the appalling disgrace of the 
English-speaking countries. We should be outspoken and fearless in demand¬ 
ing legislation which will bring about its total extinction. 

Father Jos. McNamee: Some are trying to keep men away from the saloon; 
I am with those who are going to keep the saloon away from every man, woman 
and child. 

Father Mathew: The principle of Prohibition seems to me the only safe 
and certain remedy for the evils of intemperance. This opinion has been 
strengthened by the hard labor of more than twenty years in the Temperance 
cause. 

Mr. John F. Cunneen: As a Roman Catholic I appeal to Roman Catholics 
■to stand solidly united with their Protestant brethren in this warfare against the 
saloon. How can any Catholic go to the polls and vote to continue men in the 
liquor traffic when his church calls upon them to get out? 

Mr. J. T. 0*Shea: If by sacrificing my life I could close the saloons of 
America for even one day, I would gladly make the offering at any time. 

Father Stafford (to Canadian parliamentary committee appointed in 1874 
to inquire into the causes of intemperance) : To license the liquor traffic is to 
give permission to the greatest enemy of the human race to live and grow fat on 
the tears, the lives and the eternal souls of our people. Stop the traffic, make 
the manufacture, the importation and sale of intoxicating liquors a crime of 
the worst kind. 

What of Cardinal Gibbons? 

After such a group of Roman Catholic witnesses it is hardly necessary to 
add that Cardinal Gibbons has not spoken for the Church, though senior Car- 
dinal, but only for himself in what he has said against State and national pro¬ 
hibition, and it should also be noted that he has declared for local option in the 
following words, quoted in American Brewers’ Review: “ I am in favor of local 
option applied to communities of such limited size, either of territory or of 
population, that the vote on the question can unmistakably show the majority 
sentiment for or against the sale of liquor.” 

Testimony of Conservative Protestant Witnesses. 

It would take a series of volumes to give the testimony of Protestant 
preachers against the saloon. We call as witnesses only some exceptional con¬ 
servatives who have not stood for prohibition, at least not in peace times. This 
testimony is therefore in the nature of admissions. 

Dr. I.yman Abbott, in the Outlook, August, 1911 , thus pictured the Amer¬ 
ican saloon: 

“ The evils of the liquor traffic as at present carried on in the United 
States are enormous—so great and so potent that the liquor dealers them¬ 
selves are beginning to demand reform. The economic burden which that 


WHY NO LICENSE? 


105 


traffic entails upon the communities is hard to estimate. It is a prolific 
cause of two of society’s greatest burdens, poverty and crime. But these 
economic burdens are the least. The corruption of politics, the destruction 
of families and the degradation of character caused by the excessive use of 
intoxicating liquors cannot be estimated. 

Rev. Charles H. Parkhiirst, D. D., New York, says: 

I know what these saloons are. I have visited them at all hours of the 
night and on all nights of the week, and there is not an extenuating word that 
deserves to be spoken in behalf of them. They are foul, beastly and swinish, 
the prolific hot beds of vile politics, profane ribaldry and unspeakable sensuality.” 

Official Pictures of the Saloon. 

We now add the testimony of government officials, especially because they put 
emphasis on the blighting influence of the saloon in politics. 

Let us view the standard picture of the American Saloon made by the U. S. 
Supreme Court (137 U. S. 86 ) : 

“ The statistics of every State show a greater amount of cr^me and misery 
attributable to the use of ardent spirits obtained at these liquor saloons than to 
any other source.” 

Here is a sketch of the bad influence of the saloon on municipal politics, 
made by Hon. Wm. H. Taft, before he was President: 

“If it were possible to eliminate the saloon influence, you could reduce the 
corruption attendant on any municipal political campaign to a minimum.” (See 
also p. 46 .) 

Here is the picture of the saloon business that was made with a vigorous 
hand by Ex-President Theodore Roosevelt, when he was a police commissioner: 

“ The liquor business tends to produce criminality in the population at large, 
and law-breaking among the saloon-keepers themselves. It debauches not only 
the body social but the body politic as well. (See p. 45 .) 

Saloon Domination and Saloon Damnation. 

One of the reasons why many who use liquors are by no means anti-alcohol, 
are nevertheless anti-saloon, is because this lowest branch of business, whether 
licensed or unlicensed, seek everywhere to dominate politics, in order that it 
may secure all possible concessions for itself by statute, and then further im¬ 
munity from punishment for habitual law breaking, shouting “ Liberty ” while 
debauching our free institutions. The saloon has taken the sword of politics and 
shall perish by that sword which it has so grossly abused in its own selfish and 
criminal interests. 

And here is the picture made May 26 , 1911 , at the Presbyterian General 
Assembly by one who was three times the Presidential candidate of the Demo¬ 
cratic party, Hon. Wni. J. Bryan: 

“ Shall we forever bow in subserviency to the liquor traffic, the destroyer 
of the people? A saloon is a nuisance, its influence for evil can not be confined 
to the building in which it is conducted any more than the odors of a slaughter 
house can be confined to the block in which it is located. Any unit, however 
small or large, should be permitted to rid itself of the saloon.” Later Mr. Bryan 
said: “The saloon is what it is. You can not clean it or purify it. You can 
only get rid of it by driving it out.” 

” Let us add another picture of the liquor traffic from Ex-Governor Joseph W. 
Folk, of Missouri, who illustrated more fully than any other man has done what 


106 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


Chief Executive ” means in case of a Governor, by compelling the big cities 
of his State to observe moral laws: 

“ It is a business, the natural tendency of which is toward lawlessness, and 
the time has come when it will either run the politics of the State or be run out 
of the politics of tlie State.'’ 

And here is another Democratic leader “ from Missouri,” who is ready to 
“ show ” any man or State that does not know the real saloon, just what it is: 

Congressman Champ Clark, Speaker of the National House of Representa¬ 
tives, frankly said in a newspaper interview, when asked by the reporter regard¬ 
ing the fitness of the saloon as a place for young men to frequent: 

“ Not if he is ambitious to live a clean successful life. If he wishes to excel 
in crime, rob his mental and physical powers, consort with thugs, blacklegs, 
prostitutes and thieves, be a disgrace to his family and a stench to his own 
nostrils, why I’d advise him to frequent the saloons. He can learn and be all 
that in any liquor saloon. In fact he can take his post-graduate course without 
leaving the premises. The saloon is bad mainly because of what it sells. But 
it is also bad because liquor selling always somehow creates in the premises 
where it is sold a most unhealthy atmosphere. One of the worst phases of 
the saloon life is the treating system. I have seen a half dozen choice American 
citizens, leaders in their line of work, line up in front of a bar, and in less than 
thirty minutes come out indecent jabbering idiots. A hog would feel insulted 
if any one of them should call it brother. You know how it is done. One 
threw down the dollar that he said he couldn’t afford to give his wife two hours 
before and treated the bunch. The others did the same. And so on until the 
bartender had served six orders, seventy-six drinks and had pocketed the change 
of six American sheep.” 

Saloons as a Means of Grace. 

The saloons that have been thus faithfully described are the institutions 
that Prof. Munsterberg of Harvard University, and others would allow as 
temptations to strengthen character. If such temptations made robust char¬ 
acter, then Chicago ought to furnish moral heroes enough to lead the whole 
nation. And besides the Lord’s prayer should be revised by erasing, Lead us 
not into temptation.” 

The New York Morning Sun, in June, iqi8, made the following sarcastic 
comment on a letter published in a previous issue which argued, that as great 
men and great races of the past had used intoxicating drinks, we should there¬ 
fore use them to strengthen character by providing temptations to be overcome. 
On this the editor of the Sun remarked: “ Old man Time makes an impregnable 
case. The strongest races and the most powerful peoples have been those who 
have drunk the most. Without the temptation of drink no progress. The 
stronger the drink, the more potent the temptation; ergo, the more rapid the 
progress. Undismayed and unashamed by reason of the suddenness of our 
conversion, we appeal no longer to the moderate drinker, but to Congress. In 
the name of the race and on behalf of posterity, we pray you, sirs, reverse your¬ 
selves. Take the ban off those alcoholic products of distillation commonly 
known as whiskey, rum, gin and brandy. They are the potent agents of 
progress.” 

Of course it might be argued in the same way that slave-holding and 
autocracy make men and nations strong, for most of the great nations have had 
one or both of these institutions—Egypt, Assyria, Babylon, Persia, Macedon, 
Rome. But isn’t it rather crude reasoning to cite the example of dead cities 


WHY NO LICENSE? 


107 


and nations? There is no good reason why a nation should die. They usually 
die of moral cancer, and we do well to avoid rather than imitate their vices. 
Something killed them, and the general judgment of mankind is that Drink was 
one of the killers. At any rate it did not keep them alive. The only ancient 
peoples that survive are the Chinese, the Jews and the Arabs, all abstaining or 
abstemious races. 

Let us keep Prof. Munsterberg’s theory in mind while we survey the final 
saloon picture often quoted by the witty and eloquent Irish Catholic orator, Mr. 
John F. Cunneen, my associate in a prohibition auto tour through Maine, as the 
words of a Roman Catholic priest, unnamed: 

‘'We will not trouble ourselves about what the saloon might have been, 
or ti-y the difficult task of finding an ideal saloon, but I will describe the saloon 
as it is here and now. 

“ The saloon is a place where men, women and children, having the neces¬ 
sary money, get drink—and get drunk. It is a school wherein husbands and 
fathers learn to be at ease about ill-clad, and ill-fed wives and children, and to 
fling away, those airy notions called honest pride and laudable ambition, for the 
solid gratification of their palates, and the sense of “ feeling good ” all over. It is 
a school wherein also wives and mothers learn to forget their husbands’ honor and 
their own, and to steel their hearts against the cries of neglected little ones. 
It is a school wherein sons learn to despise the quiet pure joys of home, to be¬ 
come vile in word, in act, in aspiration, and to fetter themselves, body and soul, 
with the drink demon’s chains. It is a school wherein daughters learn the 
shortest way to break their parents’ hearts, to think a blush a weakness, to prize 
drink more than decency, to become viler than the mud in the city’s streets! 

“ The saloon is the friend of the drunkard, the gambler, the prostitute, the 
blasphemer, the profaner of Sunday, the corrupt politician, the ballot-box stuffer, 
the “ repeater,” the law-breaker of every name. The saloon is, in a word, the 
friend of all that is evil, of naught that is good. It defiles all that it touches. 
It makes the good bad, and the bad worse. Like a vulture, it thrives on carrion; 
cholera-like, it feeds and fattens on physical and moral dirt, disease and degrada¬ 
tion. It breaks hearts, wrecks homes, infects society, betrays the state, and is 
the foremost ally of the devil against the church of God. It is the vestibule of 
hell. Read over its door, ‘ Leave hope behind.’ Farewell, indeed, to hope of 
honest wealth, of honorable fame, of happy life, of holy death, of heaven. Once 
begun, swift the decent and fearful. Out of many by-ways go the graduates of 
the saloon. In the gutters they wallow. In low dens and brothels they lead 
living deaths. In gloomy prison cells they pine and rot. In madman’s cages 
they rage and howl. On grim scaffolds they pay the price of blood. Only God’s 
omnipotence can snatch them from the one ending of the road they have taken: 
hell. It could, but will it? ” 

New Evidence Against the Saloon Revealed by War. 

All the preceding evidence against the saloon is on a peace basis. War’s 
curtain of fire has revealed serious anti-social wrongs in its workings which we 
fully prove elsewhere. (See pp. 19 - 50 .) But while the saloon stands at the 
bar, with all the testimony previously given of the injury it has done in peace to 
the drinkerj to his home, to even honest business, and to politics, we recall also 
in brief the treasonable part it has been shown to play in war—undermining the 
virtue and lessening the fighting strength of soldiers, lowering the working 
efficiency of munition workers, miners and builders; wasting the food and fuel 
and money and “morale” needed to win the war. The saloon, convicted in 


108 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


peace as a robber and murderer, is clearly seen in war to be a traitor. When 
all the foodstuff was needed for bread for ourselves and our Allies; and all the 
coal for munition plants and other war work; and all the money and all the man¬ 
power of body and soul for the supreme contest of the ages, the saloon insisted 
on holding for its own profiteering these necessities of war, even to the jeopardiz¬ 
ing of our victory; and when a majority of the people for months cried out for 
prohibition, stayed the hand of the Government by its hidden spell. Benedict 
Arnold never did anything half so bad as that. 

Liquor Sellers Excluded by All First Grade Fraternities. 

In addition to these individual witnesses to the harmfulness of the saloon 
we summon en masse a great cloud of witnesses, the fraternities, of which the 
following exclude from membership all who sell intoxicating liquors—a most 
damning indictment of the whole trade I verified this list by correspondence 
in 1908 . See my “ World Book of Temperance,” p. 38 . 

Masons, Odd Fellows, United Workmen, Maccabees, Tribe of Ben Hur, 
Fraternal Mystic Circle, Foresters, Catholic Benevolent Legion, Modern Wood¬ 
men, United American Mechanics, Scottish Clans, Brotherhood of Locomotive 
Engineers, Knights of Pythias, Knights of Columbus, Catholic Mutual Benefit 
Association, Loyal Americans, Knights and Ladies of Honor, Fraternal Union 
of America, Fraternal Brotherhood, National Union, Protected Home Circle, 
Heptosophs Improved Order, Royal League, Yeomen of America, Woodmen of 
the World, Brotherhood of American Yeomen, Order of the Star of Bethlehem, 

The exclusion of liquor dealers from fraternities came to be so general 
that they and their friends were driven to organize some new ones that would 
tolerate their presence. Significantly nearly all of these were named from 
beasts and birds of prey. Surely a city or town should not license men to run 
‘‘ poor men’s clubs,” as saloons are sometimes called, who are habitually excluded 
from the most ancient and honorable fraternities, which bar out the men of no 
other business. 

All Commercialized Vices Offer Some Excuses. 

There must be something to say in rebuttal for an institution that so many 
have supported The Saloon’s rebuttal today is faint and feeble, and repeats 
the same excuses for tolerating drink that have been made for about all the 
cast off institutions that have been sent to the limbo of crimes against civilization 
in the twenty Christian centuries. When the reformers proposed the abolition of 
the Roman arena, where savage beasts and gladiators and martyrs were “ slain 
to make a Roman holiday,” doubtless its defenders objected because it would 
throw so many gladiators and attendants out of employment, and deprive the 
State of revenue; and they may have suggested that the working classes would 
make trouble if deprived of their customary amusement. No doubt some of the 
defenders of the brutal arena urged that it should be regulated more strictly by 
raising the license fee and manicuring the lions, and perhaps omitting “ thumbs 
down.” Probably some urged that if the killing was not done in the arena just 
as much killing would be done in secret cock pits, and the government would 
get no revenue. They urged, no doubt, that there is in the human race an inherent 
craving for killing which must be accepted as a fact, and the arena counted a 
benevolent institution because it puts that craving under public supervision and 
regulation. 

Polygamy was defended—and still is—as Scriptural, just as the liquor 
devil quotes Scripture to this purpose. Polygamy was and is defended as a 


WHY NO LICENSE? 


109 


pleasure that prevents worse evils. Piracy was defended as an ancient and 
romantic way of making a living. What would the pirates do for a living if 
deprived of their occupation? Duelling had the defense of custom and alleged 
honor. Men would become cowards if not allowed to fight. Slavery was de¬ 
fended, as the liquor traffic is, from the Bible, and because it was a legalized 
business. What could “King Cotton” do without his slaves? Opium was 
defended as a solace in sorrow, and as a necessaiy evil that must be allowed to 
certain races and classes. Banks holding opium securities might start financial 
troubles if it was prohibited, or opium users might “ start something ” if out off 
from their dope. In any case they would do something just as bad and so it 
would make things no better, and an easy source of revenue would be lost. 

Arthur Burrage Farwell quotes a policeman of Hyde Park, Illinois, who 
apologized for tolerating a gambling den on the ground that if it was closed 
the gamblers would be holding up citizens on the street. 

In all these cases men interested to hold on to muddy and bloody gold plead 
for restriction instead of prohibition. They urged that men could not be made 
good by act of Congress. The preachers should “ preach the Gospel,” instead 
of appealing to law and force. When all men were educated and converted, evils 
would cease, but till then we might as well accept human nature as it is and make 
vice pay for its damages in taxation. 

Such excuses for the licensed saloon instead of mitigating the case against 
it, only add another proved count to the indictment. Its poisoning of the minds 
and souls of officials and of many private citizens who do not patronize the 
saloon, hut by voting license agree to let its crimes go on for a share of its 
blood money; and having done so can never see straight when the saloon question 
is up for judgment. This poisoning of the public mind is worse than the poison¬ 
ing of the drinker's body by so much as the public welfare is more than any 
individual interest. 

The license system not only poisons the State—the legislative, judicial and 
executive officers and the citizens, save those of heroic mold who never consent 
to it by ballot or even by silence—it also poisons the channels of honest trade, 
where every legalized business must have its right of way; and it even poisons 
the church to some extent, for church members are in politics and in business, 
and can not—or at least will not wholly dissociate themselves from any legalized 
business. The only way to get this blood-poisoning out of the system is to put 
the liquor traffic out of business 

It has seemed necessary to show the real nature and influence of the saloon 
by a great cloud of witnesses because many voters never saw a saloon on the 
inside in full action, late on a Saturday night when most of the patrons are too 
drunk to restrain their appetites or even guard their wages against robbery. 

The Sin and Folly of License. 

It is this beastly, swinish saloon, the prolific nest of disease, disorder and 
poverty, of which Rev. John Pierpont said in an attack on license seventeen years 
before the Maine law was enacted: 

“ And will ye give to man a bill 
Divorcing him from Heavens high sway? 

And while God says, ‘ Thou shalt not kill,’ 

Say ye, ‘ For gold ye may, ye may ? ’ ” 


110 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


It was this traffic of which the Methodist General Conference of the United 
States said, in 1888 : “ The liquor traffic can never be legalized without sin. 
License, high or low, is vicious in principle and powerless as a remedy.” 

Voters are asked to denaturize this demoralizing saloon and proclaim it an 
honorable business, to be conducted openly beside the banks and bakeries It is 
amazing that the business man who would resent the offer of $75 for his vote, 
openly favors licensing the saloon because its license fee would lighten his taxes — 
75 cents, provided there was no offset in the consequent increase of crime and 
poverty, which cost him at least ten times the 75 cents for which he sells his 
vote and risks his own and his neighbor’s boy 

There may be some cases where a community is so backward or corrupt that 
“ No license ” or prohibition could not be enforced, or at least would not be 
enforced if enacted. But that is no reason why the saloon should be legalized 
any more than the other vices that go on in the same cities. Let every intelligent 
and humane voter at least keep his own hands clean The worst “ black hand ” 
is the one that votes license for the devilish traffic that destroys body and soul, 
home and liberty. It would be folly to break the sword and surrender to the 
foe because the hands that have wielded it have sometimes been weak or timid 
or corrupt. The Decalogue has not been repealed because Sodom disregarded it. 
In the words of George Washington, which New York has cut on the Wash¬ 
ington Arch: 

“ Let us raise a standard to which the wise and honest can repair. 
The event is in the hand of God.” 

Actual Tests of No License. 

Having shown the harmfulness of the liquor traffic and the failure of ffie 
alternative license, we turn to the evidence that prohibition is the most effective 
governmental restriction of the liquor evil. We have to do in this case only 
with local prohibition by “ local veto ” or “ local option ” or “ home rule.” 


COMPARATIVE ARRESTS FOR DRUNKENNESS 


Tnc Same Massackusetts Cities Under License and No-License 


BROCKTON ) 
WALTHAM j 
TAUNTON I 
CHELSEA J 
NEWBURY- 
PORT / 

LOWELL } 
SALEM j 

WOBURN j 
FITCHBURG j 


1898, License 

1899, .No-License 

1900, License 

1901, No-License 

1900, No-License 

1901, License 

1901, No-License 

1902, License 

1901, License 

1902, No-License 

1902, License 

1903, No-License 

1903, License 

1904, No-License 

1903, License 

1904, No-License 

1905, License 

1906, No-License 


1627 

455 

634 

179 

482 

1202 

398 

1246 

673 

150 

4077 

2304 

1432 

842 

204 

1160 

359 


With License the arrests for drunkenness in the same cities are from 2 to nearly 5 times as great as 
with No-License. (Chart prepared by Massachusetts No-License League.) 


These proportions are repeated with monotonous regularity in other tables 
not only of Massachusetts, but in other no license States. From this early story 
of Massachusetts we jump to its yet more favorable record for 1917 - 18 . The 
argument of the liquor forces that a no-license law in a town does not materially 
reduce the amount of drinking in that town, particularly if it happens to be 





















WHY NO LICENSE? 


Ill 


near another place where liquor can be procured, suffers a hard knock by the 
statistics of arrests for drunkenness in Massachusetts for the saloon year ending 
April 30, 1918. These figures, which are official and authoritative, show that 
the proportion of arrests in license cities in the State was 36.51 per 1,000, while 
in no-license cities it was only 8.77 per 1,000. 

A word of stinging protest is needed and Massachusetts needs it as much 
as any other State—perhaps more—against the city that stays wet just because 
a neighbor town is dry, and the merchants hope that some of the drinkers who 
come across the town line to get booze will spend some of their money for 
other goods. “ A license town, in its saloons maintains an open cesspool at the 
doors of its neighbor towns, and is, therefore, a nuisance. Let the good people 
of such a town think of what it means to the homes of surrounding towns to 
have fathers, brothers and sons coming home drunk simply because one such 
town in the region hasn’t decency enough to clean up! ” 


No License Has Better Chance in West. 

In Massachusetts no license has won against the greatest handicaps, because 
big wet towns are usually near to those that vote dry, and the population is largely 
of foreign birth and naturally prejudiced against prohibition, and especially the 
** bone dry ” brand. In Western States with population more American and 
more scattered we get better results. As we cite the experience of Massachusetts 
as representative of local option States of the East we subjoin as representative 
of Western local option States, reports of mayors of dry towns of Minnesota, 
sent to the State Anti-Saloon League early in 1916. The population given is 
that of 1910 census, on which there has been a considerable increase. 

Cloquet, Minn., 7,031 Population—'' City dry since Nov., 1913. Pros¬ 
perity increased, volume of business larger; 1913 tax rate 5.57, 1914, 4.89; 1915, 
5.33. Since the town went dry large improvements have been made. In 1914 
there were 16,600 square yards of paving done. In 1915 a reservoir built, costing 
$10,000, and fire hall, costing $12,000. Bank deposits increased, although the 
figures are about the same as they were in 1913, this is really a big increase as 
during 1915 the lumber business was very poor and as this is a lumber town, it is 
a big item to hold our own under conditions as they were in 1915. Collections 
much better. Vacant store buildings about the same. Sentiment for a dry town 
stronger than ever. Decrease in poverty and only half as many arrests. 

Fergus Falls, 6,887 Population—“ Our city dry three years. Increase of 
prosperity. Taxes a little higher. Bank deposits increased. Collections better. 
No vacant stores or vacant houses in the town. Sentiment for a dry town is 
stronger than ever. Decrease in poverty and less arrests. Our people are 
prosperous and happy and many of the old soaks are now paying their debts 
contracted during the wet regime. I used to favor high license, believing it to be 

for the best of the city. I now know I was wrong.” 

Fairmont, 2,958 Population—“ Fairmont dry ten months. Increase of 
prosperity. Volume of business larger. Present tax rate somewhat higher, but 
because new school building, costing $125,000, has been built. Bank deposits 
increased. Collections better. Less vacant stores and houses. Sentiment for 
dry town stronger than ever. Poverty decreased. Less arrests.” 

Similar reports are in the record from ten towns all conservatively favorable. 


112 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


No License Benefits in the South. 

In the South, as in the West, with population more native and less urban, 
the working of no license is more satisfactory than in Northeastern States and 
reversions from dry to wet States are less frequent. We select Florida as a 
good sample of Southern States and out of reports sent to State Anti-Saloon 
League from eleven dry counties, all favorable to no license, we quote that 
which presents the usual results in the fullest and best classified form, namely, 
Palatka, of Putnam County: 

“If saloons would help any town, they should have helped this, as we have 
had plenty of them for over fifty years. Up to 1907, the year we got the 
saloons out, we had a dilapidated old town, no concrete sidewalks, no brick- 
paved streets. Many times I have seen planks laid across the street in the 
main business section in order to get across after a rain. 

Impro\'t:ments Begin : Now we have about nine miles of brick-paved streets 
and nearly thirty miles of granolithic sidewalks. Population grown to 6,000, 
over 3,000 white. 

Taxes Lowered: Since we got saloons out we have done this paving and 
built a bridge across St. Johns River at cost of $45,460.36; also court house at 
cost of $34,998.05, and made many miles of hard-surfaced roads leading in all 
directions. City water that cost each family $10.00 per year in saloon times now 
furnished by city free. Taxes lowered two mills. 

Vacant Houses Filled: In 1907 there were many vacant stores and cot¬ 
tages. Since then many built and all occupied. Not a decent house today vacant. 

Enemies Convinced: Many who worked hard to keep saloons here, hon¬ 
estly believing that their removal would injure business, now come forward like 
men and acknowledge their mistake. One bought a brick property just before 
the dry movement began, at $1,900, and sold it last year for over $7,000, and 
had put only $400 improvements on it. 

Property Values Increase : Many pieces of property doubled in value. A 
brick property that sold for $10,000 two months after town went “ dry ” cannot 
be bought today for $20,000. Putnam House, closed for years, reopened about 
two years ago, is now flourishing. Owners so encouraged they have put in over 
$6,000 in improvements. Man went to the owner of Putnam House and asked 
aid in getting saloons back only to receive emphatic answer: “If saloons open 
here again, I will be gone and Putnam House will be for sale for what it will 
bring.’’ 

Condition of the Colored People: Many of the colored people now own 
homes, many are building, others buying on the installment plan and keeping their 
bills paid. The colored Baptists have replaced their old church with a nice 
brick building seating 1,200 people. The present pastor has been here seven 
months and has raised $3,332, and taken in 142 members. The A. M. E. people 
have replaced their old wooden structure with a stone church, a real beauty, and 
a credit to any town. They burned their mortgage just before Christmas. The 
M. E. colored people got proud, too, and built a brick church, with a basement 
and kitchen, and they can cook, eat and be happy,—and they are happy! There 
are six other colored churches in town, and all are flourishing. They claim 
eighteen secret orders among them. 

The City Beautiful: Our ladies have taken great pride in beautifying our 
town, cleaning vacant lots, making parks, planting flowers and shrubbery, with 
grass on the city hall lot and the courthouse square. They did not do this in 


WHY NO LICENSE? 


113 


saloon times, because they had no heart or disposition to try for a beautiful city, 
with so much saloon trash about on all sides.” 

The story of dry and wet towns under no license in other States is monotously 
alike in that everywhere, despite wet towns near at hand, there are fewer arrests, 
better collections, increasd prosperity and never any trouble about the lost 
revenue. The tax rate is either reduced or increased only because of better 
schools and other public improvemnts. The money formerly spent for drink 
does not vanish into thin air but goes into other and better purchases, and the 
increased taxes on these new investments of real and personal estate more than 
takes the place of the saloon licenses, that were really paid mostly out of the 
pockets of the poor, whose bad debts and crime and poverty made additional 
taxes, which the dry policy saved. 

The President of the Kentucky W. C. T. U. gives two short stories which 
like a flash-light show the benefits of no license in Kentucky, the first State to 
adopt local option, under which most of the State has long been dry, io6 counties 
out of 120. 

When Casey County was wet the Circuit Judge was asked about the civil 
docket? He replied: “ We are more than two years behind, and have asked for 
a special term to try the civil cases. We have three terms of court, two weeks 
each term, which are entirely filled with criminal cases and we are never up with 
the criminal docket.” The county went dry and four years later, Mrs. Beauchamp 
again asked the question, “What about the court docket?” He said: “We 
have entirely cleared up our criminal docket, and now we easily dispose of all 
the business in two or three days of each term of court.” 

Pulaski County, the largest county in the State, had fifteen, saloons in the 
towns. All the county came under local prohibition except the county seat. 
The saloons had paid a thousand dollars a year license. Despite the fact that 
many feared it would be very difficult to raise the taxes necessary, they voted 
out the saloons. The merchants and business men of the town were immediately 
taxed ten dollars to meet the anticipated deficit. At the end of the first year, 
the taxes were removed; the town had extended the street car line, which they 
had been told would be abolished; they had put in a fountain; beautified the 
central square of the city, and made other improvements. For the first time the 
city was entirely out of debt. The criminal docket had gone from occupying 
almost the entire term of court to a matter of a few days. 

And yet Barnum’s estimate that “ a sucker is born evei*y minute ” is verified 
by the number of business men that have sense enough to make money, who 
haven’t sense enough to see the fallacy on the face of the saying that “ prohibi¬ 
tion makes a dead town.” To a man who thinks “ life ” is in abounding quarrels, 
murders, adulteries and riots, a dry town may seem “ dead.” East St. Louis, 
with scores dead and hundreds wounded in saloon riots, was that a live town? 
Saloons produce death in no merely figurative sense. They are “ murder mills,” 
as long since labeled, and the citizens furnish the boys that become both the 
murderers and the murdered; and the citizens pay the costs in court and charity 
expenses and lost man-power. Save when some nation-wide or world-wide 
financial depression comes with prohibition it always improves honest business 
by turning a part of the drink expenditures to honest trade. But that is the 
smallest part of the benefit. The change from moral death to joyous life in 
drunkard’s homes is a greater boon. Prohibition makes life worth living. New¬ 
port, R. I., was made dxy by executive order of Secretary Daniels, March i6, 
1918. The chief of Police states that before saloons closed he had five or six 


114 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


women eveiy month who complained of their husbands coming home drunk, 
having spent all their wages in saloons on Saturday night. No further credit 
being allowed at the grocers, wives asked help. After saloons closed domestic 
trouble ceased. He had no complaints up to date of report four months later. 

They say that closing saloons “ hurts business.” Sure it does—some kinds. 


THE TOWN’S GONE DRY. 


These “dry” days we hear complaining, 
That the sheriff’s work is waning, 

Now the town’s gone dry. 

There’s less work for vice inspectors, 
And for cops and crime detectors. 

Less to do for bill collectors, 

Now the town’s gone dry. 


Men don’t show up dull and dizzy, 
Ambulances not so busy, 

Now the town’s gone dry. 

Hands are steady, eyes are truer. 
Accidents in mines are fewer; 

Yes, the undertaker’s bluer. 

Since the town’s gone dry. 


Trade in dope and guns is failing. 

Yes, the pawnshop men are wailing. 
Now the town’s quite dry. 

Though the place of late has grown some. 
Business of that sort has flown some. 

All the town-sharks here are lonesome, 
Now the town’s gone dry. 


Grafters view the fact with loathing. 

But there’s “bully” trade in clothing. 
Now the town’s gone dry. 

All the redlight gang may blow sir. 

But the baker and the grocer. 

Hear them kicking? No, you don’t, sir. 
Why? The town’s gone dry. 


—Adapted from Berton Braley, U. S. A. 


The case is fully submitted. That the liquor traffic is harmful, and that 
even local prohibition greatly reduces the evils that result from it, is over¬ 
whelmingly proved. More than that, it is proved that the licensing of the sale 
of poisonous beverages is inherently wrong, and coidd not he justified even if 
its evil results were less apparent and the remedy were less satisfactory. 

It was a police court and one of the usual line of drunks was before the 
judge. There was no dispute about the fact that he had been drunk and dis¬ 
orderly, “ Three months,” said the judge. There was something in the face of 
the prisoner’s careworn wife who stood by that challenged the judge’s attention 
and he said to her apologetically, “ I’m sorry, but I had to do it.” There was 
nothing in her face to suggest a Porthia come to judgment, but she said earnestly, 
“ Judge, woulden’t it be better to lock up the saloons and let my hus¬ 
band GO to work ? ” 


IS GOVERNMENT OWNERSHIP OF DRINK TRAFFIC A DELIVERANCE 

OR DELUSION? 

Should the State conduct the beverage sale of intoxicants? Some good peo¬ 
ple say so. What is the essence of their logic? The major premise is: The 
growth of the liquor traffic, with its attendent evils, is due more to the greed of 
the seller than to the appetite of the buyer. The minor premise is: If the liquor 
were sold by government employees, whose salaries would not be increased by in¬ 
creased sales, the profits being devoted to schools and charities—since cheapening 
the liquors would be considered dangerous—the element of cupidity would be 
eliminated. The conclusion is. Eliminating cupidity from the liquor traffic thus 
would eliminate most of its harm. 

Not even the minor premise is correct. The dispensary does not even in 
theory, much less in practice, dispense with cupidity but only extends it to a 
larger number of people, retaining personal cupidity and adding social cupidity. 
The taxpayer does not see that the liquor traffic, which he is thus bribed to spare 
when it should be slain, increases his taxes for pauperism and crime. 



THE VERDICT OF THE AGES ON ALCOHOL. 


115 


The Verdict of the Ages on Alcohol. 

Annual Sermon by Rev. Wilbur F. Crafts, Ph, D., to National Association of Temper¬ 
ance Officials, Leeds, England, July 29 , 1913 . 

At the bar of civilization stand John Barroom and John Barleycorn, the drink 
traffic and the drink habit, charged with crimes against individuals and homes, and 
treason against the nation and the world, because of their destruction of property and 
life and civil liberty. John Barroom is regarded by many as the chief offender be¬ 
cause the bar room is a composite of many evils—alcohol plus bad associations. The 
bar room is a nest where all foul birds flock together; idleness, adultery, robbery, mur¬ 
der, bribery, anarchy. John Barleycorn poisons himself, and no one has a right to 
commit suicide whether suddenly or slowly; but John Barroom is a promoter of 
poisoning, not only of the individual but of the Government. The verdict of the jury, 
which we shall poll, is partly against one of the offenders, but in most cases against 
both. John Barroom could not do business without John Barleycorn as partner. It 
is time, as Dr. Francis E. Willard suggested, that we should follow our “ anti-saloon ” 
campaign with an anti-alcohol campaign, and work not alone for “ a saloonless nation ” 
but also for AN ALCOHOL-FREE WORLD. 

Let us poll our jury. 

I. The Verdict of Religion. 

In the final crusade for worldwide prohibition, it is a decisive fact that all re¬ 
ligions are for it. Hinduism, Buddhism and Mohammedanism are all known as “ total 
abstinence religions.” But for that fact so-called “ Christian nations ” would in Asia, 
as in Africa, have “ made a thousand drunkards to one Christian.” The figures are 
those of a conservative Archbishop of Canterbury. Christianity is also a total ab¬ 
stinence religion—seen to be so much more clearly since the Revised Version substi¬ 
tuted for the old translation, “ Abstain from every appearance of evil,” the command, 
” Abstain from every form of evil.” Will any one say that a traffic and usage that, in 
the words of Gladstone, has ” done more harm than war, pestilence and famine,” is 
not a “form of evil”? If it is, we are commanded to abstain from all participation in 
it, whether by drinking or selling or voting. 

The Bible doctrine of abstinence, whose evolution begins with abstinence re¬ 
quired of priests on duty, and encouraged in Nazarites for limited periods, reached the 
standard of total abstinence for one’s own sake under Solomon—“ Look not thou upon 
the wine when it is red”; and the standard of prohibition under Habbakkuk—“Woe 
unto him that giveth his neighbor drink.” If a man may not even give it, he surely 
may not sell it. 

Let us not forget that Catholics, to an increasing degree, are with us in the fight 
against drink. Hear the word of Archbishop Ireland: “Education, the elevation of 
the masses, liberty—all that we, the age, admires—is set at naught by this dreadful 
evil. The individual conscience is the first arm in opposing it, but the individual con¬ 
science has to be strengthened and supplemented by law. The claim of saloon keepers 
to freedom in their traffic is the claim to spread disease, sin, and pauperism.” 

The verdict of religion is: 

Pledge in thy noblest mood against thy worst; 

Pray then for strength to keep the sacred trust; 

Prohibit, too, the drink by God accursed. 

II. The Verdict of Athletics. 

So far back as the famous Greek games, athletes in training were required to 
abstain. Strange that men in those days nevertheless thought the liquors a man must 
avoid as an athlete would strengthen a workrnan for his task. In a modern walking 
match held at Kiel, Germany, the first four winners were abstainers. Among the ten 
prize winners, six were abstainers, and two of the others had lived entirely abstinent 
for months before the contest. Of the twenty-four abstainers who entered the race, 
only two failed to reach the goal; of the fifty-nine non-abstainers, thirty failed to 
reach it. The verdict of athletics in all ages is that the man who would win in the race 
of a day or the race of life must abstain. And the race that shall win the new race of in- 


116 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


ternational trade competition, in which Britain, Germany and the United States have 
been the chief competitors, will be the race that is most abstinent. Here wc find a 
patriotic argument for abstinence and prohibition. For my own sake, for Christ’s 
sake, for my country’s sake, for the sake of the human race, I should exclude liquors 
from my own lips and from my own land, 

III. The Verdict of Insurance. 

In 1844 , Robert Warner, of London, a Quaker abstainer,—there were few abstainers 
then in any fold—applied for life insurance. His examination was satisfactory except 
in one point, namely, that he drank water instead of wine or whiskey. On the ground 
that he was thus endangering his health, he was rejected as “a bad life,” that is, a 
bad risk. Later he was offered insurance if he would pay ten per cent, extra on 
account of the extra hazardous conditions in which he had placed himself by his 
“water habit.” Instead of accepting this proposition, he gathered a few abstaining 
friends together and organized what is now called “The United Kingdom Temperance 
and General Provident Institution,” which for a while insured abstainers only, but 
soon opened a separate section for moderate drinkers, rebating to members of each 
section whatever the whole section fell short of the expected mortality, as scheduled 
in the regular insurance tables. The same plan was adopted later by the Sceptre Life 
Association, also of London, and the Scottish Temperance Life Insurance Company. 
In the first and second named the actual deaths of abstainers fell short of the expected 
mortality twenty-seven per cent more than the moderate drinkers. In the other case 
the abstainers’ gain was twenty-six per cent. The “life abstainer” in the oldest of 
these companies may have twenty-five per cent off at the start, unless he prefers to 
have it added to the policy every five years. American companies have not usually 
given the abstainer rebates, but the American statistics tell the same story, as witness 
the following figures of President Green, of the Mutual Life Insurance Company of 
Hartford, Conn. The expectancy of life at 20 years for an abstainer is 44 additional 
years, for a moderate drinker 15 ; at 40 years, 28 and 11 respectively; at 60 , 15 and 8. 

Neither the individual nor the community can afford to tolerate bar rooms that 
promote for profit a habit that shortens as well as weakens human lives. 

IV. The Verdict of Business. 

The practical investigations of business men a few years ago, that half the railroad 
accidents were due to befuddled brains, for which reason abstainers came to be pre¬ 
ferred for railway service, were among the many economic reasons that led more than 
half of the business establishments of the United States (51 per cent), as shown by a 
Govrnment investigation of a representative number, to give preference, in selecting 
employes, to total abstainers over the most moderate drinkers. Recent discoveries, 
which prove that a man can not hear an alarm bell or see a red light as quickly three 
days after taking one bottle of wine as if he had let it alone, will make it increasingly 
difficult for a drinking man to get a job in this age of steam and electricity. Hear 
what Mr. Carnegie says to young men of alcohol as a stumbling block in the path 
to success: “The first and most seductive peril, and the destroyer of most young men, 
is the drinking of liquor. I am no temperance lecturer in disguise, but a man who 
knows and tells what observation has proven to him, and I say to you that you are 
more likely to fail in your career from acquiring the habit of drinking liquor than from 
any or all the other temptations likely to assail you.” 

V. The Verdict of Fraternities. 

Why is it that liquor dealers are excluded from the privilege of membership not 
only of most of the churches, but also by the leading fraternities,—the Masons’ the 
Odd Fellows, the Ancient Order of United Workmen, the Knights of Maccabees’ the 
Tribe of Ben Hur, the American Legion of Honor, the Fraternal Mystic Circle’ the 
Catholic Benevolent Legion, the Woodmen of the World, the Modern Woodmen of 
America, the Order of United American Mechanics and the Junior Order of the same 
the Order of the Scottish Clans, and many more? Could there be a stronger evidence 
that the drink traffic is anti-social? There are some good men who do not seem to 
know that several of the fraternal orders that are named after beasts and birds of 
prey were organized to make a fellowship for liquor dealers who had been excluded 
from the churches and from all first class fraternities. 



THE VERDICT OF THE AGES ON ALCOHOL. 


117 


VI. The Verdict of Modem Science. 

Let me express this verdict in language that even the children can understand, 
though the truths are great enough to interest the most learned. Every child is sup¬ 
posed to know Gulliver’s story of the giant Brobdignag, attacked and conquered by a 
great army of tiny fairies, called Lihputians. “ Fact is stranger than fiction ” in the 
true story science is telling about man, the giant, attacked by a great army of microbes, 
germs, parasites, bacteria, who are bad fairies, so small that man can not see these 
tiny foes—indeed did not know till lately whence came the poison arrows that produce 
diseases which have cut down life from hundreds to scores of years. But in this case 
there is also a Liliputian army for the defense of man. The good fairies that defend 
us are the leucocytes—“ little white soldiers ” that swim in the red rivers of our blood, 
and whenever the microbes steal through our mouths or otherwise into our bodies, 
these “ white guards ” swim quickly to the spot and kill them and eat them. They 
leave no dead on the battlefield. When mouths are shut and bodies are whole, the 
microbes cannot get into us. When we get a scratch on the hand, the little enemies 
rush in through this break in the wall and shoot poison arrows into the blood. We 
feel the pain and poison. But quickly our white bodyguard comes swimming to the 
breach and holds the enemy back. If we keep our white soldiers sober and strong 
we need not be afraid of microbes. The little white soldiers need a good many of 
them for their daily rations. 

But if we put wine, or beer, or whiskey or any other intoxicating drink down our 
throats, it makes our little defenders sleepy and stupid, and they don’t “watch out” 
and fight our little foes, and then “ all the germs from Germany, and all the parasites 
from Paris, and all the mike-robes from Ireland will get us.” 

This is the way Dr. Taav Laitinen states it: “Alcohol, even in comparatively 
small doses, exercises a prejudicial effect on the protective mechanism of the human 
body.” And this is a still more learned statement on the effect of alcohol, which was 
signed on my initiative, by many great doctors at the Twelfth International Congress 
on Alcoholism: “Exact laboratory, clinical and pathological research have demon¬ 
strated that alcohol is a dehydrating, protoplasmic poison, and hence its use as a 
beverage is destructive and degenerating to the human organism. Its effects on the 
cells and tissues of the body are depressive, narcotic and anaesthetic. Hence, thera¬ 
peutically, it should be used with the same care and restrictions as other poisonous 
drugs.” 


What Alcohol Really Is. 

These Liliputian foes in the air are always watching for a chance to get into the 
fruits and grains also, for their sweet juices. They cannot get at the juices of the 
grape while it is whole, but an army of “ ferments ” camps on the grape—that is what 
looks like velvet—and waits for it to be broken. When the grape is broken in the 
wine-press or in any other way they rush in and gorge themselves, and leave their 
liquid excrement. That is what alcohol is. Now sing of your “ruby wine.” In the 
same way when the barley is crushed, the yeast plants hovering in the air get in and 
gorge themselves on the sweets and excrete alcohol. If girls learn in childhood just 
what the nasty alcoholic drinks really are, do you think that when they become grown¬ 
up ladies they will ever offer the alcohol in wine, beer or in any form to their gentle¬ 
men friends? If this fact about the nature of alcohol was made known to everybody 
by faithful use of temperance lessons in public schools and Sunday schools and by 
posters put up in every town, and by accurate leaflets circulated from door to door, I 
am sure many “ moderate drinkers ” would refuse to be fooled any longer by the 
“ mocker ” that pretends to bring health and joy, but really brings sickness and sorrow. 

Alcohol as Foe of Efficiency. 

Science speaks not only with reference to health, but also of the relation of alcohol 
to physical and mental efficiency. Professor Kraepelin, at Heidelberg University, by 
testing the effects of alcohol upon mental work, showed that under the influence of 
alcohol a man memorized 60 figures after 60 repetitions, while before taking the 
alcohol he memorized 100 with only 40 repetitions. The exercise requiring the highest 
powers of the mind were most seriously affected by alcohol. We hear much of the 


118 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


effect of liquors on workmen, but the lowered efficiency of captains of armies and 
captains of industry are much more serious. When a glass of champagne made a rail¬ 
way president blab his plans to beat another railroad his “ extra dry ” cost at least 
a million. 

President C. W. Elliott says of the effects of alcohol on action and reaction of 
mind and body: 

“ The short interval between seeing a flash of light and putting your muscles in 
motion to touch a spot on the table is the time reaction. It is demonstrated that 
alcohol, even in the most moderate quantity, affects unfavorably that time reaction, 
that is, slows the whole nervous action of the man who takes it. I had occasion to 
know about the time reaction of a once famous pugilist. He was expecting to fight 
in a city some distance from Boston. The appointment was made, but he had been 
out on a succession of sprees. He was brought to Cambridge and his time reaction 
was tested. It was very slow. Now, this man had always been famous for the quick¬ 
ness of his time reaction. A pugilist has need to have a very short time reaction. He 
must see by the motion of his opponent's fist just where he is going to strike,^ and 
put his own arm in the way quickly. Alcohol in very moderate doses diminishes 
efficiency.” 

No w^onder President Eliot, in the light of such experiments, declares that it is 
“ inexpedient ” for even a self-controlled gentleman to drink at all. And the same 
evidence proves it inexpedient for a Government to license institutions which pro¬ 
mote industrial inefficiency. The employer or employee who drinks administers to 
himself an industrial anesthetic. He is not giving those who pay his wage or salary 
the full powers of body and mind for which they pay. 

VII. The Verdict of Flistory. 

For a hundred years America has been the world’s experiment station for alcohol. 
Sincere men have solemnly TRIED TO MAKE POISON BEVERAGES HARM¬ 
LESS BY SELLING THEM IN NEW WAYS: low license, high license, govern¬ 
ment ownership, and even doxology saloons—we have tried everything and have found 
NOTHING HELPS EXCEPT TOTAL ABSTINENCE, AND PROHIBITION. 
THAT IS THE DOUBLE VERDICT OF HISTORY. We prohibit the saloon as a 
promoter of drinking, an enemy of the home and of honest business, a “ germ center 
of lawlessness,” and a “ conscienceless corruptor of American politics. The one thing 
on which the great leaders of all parties, such men as Taft and Roosevelt, and Bryan, 
and Champ Clark, and leaders of all faiths, and speakers for ” wets ” and ” drys,” and 
even liquor papers are agreed upon is THAT THE SALOON IS AN HABITUAL 
CRIMINAL. That is the real meaning of the slogan the liquor men pay to publish, 
” Prohibition won’t prohibit,” which is only a veiled threat that liquor dealers will 
not obey the law if enacted. That anarchistic threat is sufficient reason why any true 
patriot should vote out this arch-anarchist; and, there are some who wdll so vote not 
because they are opposed to alcoholic drinks, or even to barrooms, but because they 
will no longer tolerate the domination of State and local politics by any business in 
its own selfish interest. 

Conclusion of the Whole Matter. 

The autocracy and anarchy of alcohol are the supreme counts against it, a double 
treason. The habitual anarchy of the liquor traffic, trampling on even the mild laws 
set to restrain it, is worse than any wrong it does to individual victims; but its domina¬ 
tion of even the best democracies in politics is its supreme treason, and the ominous 
cloud in their sky. 

In the United States and Great Britain we have discussed the drink problem too 
exclusively as only a hygienic, economic and moral problem. France, aroused to study 
the alcohol peril because of the increasing tendency of its birth-rate to fall below the 
death rate, HAS PUT THE PATRIOTIC ARGUMENT UPPERMOST IN ITS 
OFFICIAL WARNINGS AGAINST EVEN MODERATE DAILY USE OF BEER 
AND WINE AS THE CHIEF CAUSE OF THE ALARMING DECLINE IN 
BIRTH RATE: “ For the health of the individual, for the existence of the family, FOR 
THE FUTURE OF THE NATION, alcohol is one of the most terrible scourges.” 

Nowhere better than in that slogan do we find expressed the verdict of the ages 
on alcohol. 

And if alcohol is such a ” terrible scourge ” to individual and family and nation 
THE VERDICT SHOULD BE FOLLOWED BY A SENTENCE OF DEATH TO 
BE EXECUTED THROUGH THE PLEDGE AND PROHIBITION 


HANDWRITING ON THE WALL OF KING ALCOHOL 


119 


IjatiJitnrtting m Hall of 2Ctn0 AlrolyoL 

Address by Rev. Wilbur F. Crafts, Ph. D. 


The doom of King Alcohol is being 
written by a divine Hand whose five 
fingers are hygiene, efficiency, heredity, 
patriotism, humanity. 

I. The Finger of Hygiene. 

The laws of nature are really the oldest 
testament, but only recently have its 
hieroglyphics, written in the white and 
red of nerve cells and blood corpuscles, 
found a Daniel to interpret them. It was 
at the feet of the foremost medical ex¬ 
perts of Germany, France, Britain and 
the United States that President C. W. 
Eliot, of Harvard University, unlearned, 
at seventy, his life long theory that a 
gentleman might properly drink beer and 
wine in moderation. He now proclaims 
that in the light of modern science it is 
“ inexpedient ” to drink intoxicants at all. 

But the strongest proof that alcoholic 
drinks injure health and shorten life is 
the testimony of life insurance. 

AVERAGE LENGTH OF LIFE 

As Shown by Experience of 
European Insurance Societies 

Total Abstainer at 20 years of age 
and after 

20 Years Expectation 44 Years 

Average Life 64 Years 

Moderate Drinker at 20 years of age and 
after 

20 Years Expectation 31 Years 

Average Life 51 Years 

Loss 13 Years 


Hard Drinker at 20 years of age and after 

Expectation 15 Years 



Average Life 35 Years 

Loss 29 Years 

For Health and Long Life, Abstain. 

British insurance societies that have 
insured total abstainers and moderate 
drinkers separately for long periods— 
one for half a century—have found that 
even the purest and mildest intoxicating 
drinks, taken in moderation at home, are 
slow poisons, that kill almost half a year 


of life each year, so that moderate drink¬ 
ers 20 years of age die on the average at 
51, which is 13 years sooner than they 
would die if abstainers. ' 


II. The Finger of Efficiency. 



Copyright 1910, Scientific Temperance Federation 
Prof. G. Aschaffenberg’s experiments made on 
four printers on four consecutive days. Lined 
Blocks represent average of work done on absti¬ 
nent days (1st and 3rd). Black Blocks represent 
average of work done on alcohol days (2nd and 
4th). White Outlines show how far each man 
fell short of accomplishing work expected. Aver¬ 
age loss of working ability due to alcohol about 
9 %. Loss of working ability greatest in Man A, 
heaviest drinker; least in Man D, lightest drinker 
but his work far short of expected. 










































120 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION 


The old argument for abstinence was 
that one who drinks may become a 
drunkard; the new argument is that only 
by abstinence can one reach the highest 
efficiency. As John G. Wooley says, 
“ The argument is no longer failure but 
fitness.” The United States Bureau of 
Labor sums up a report on “ The Eco¬ 
nomic Aspects of the Liquor Question,” 
based partly on answers to questions 
sent to a representative list of American 
employers, in these words: “More than 
half the establishments reporting require 
in certain occupations and under certain 
circumstances, that employees shall not 
use intoxicating liquors.” 

Among the most convincing proofs 
that alcohol reduces efficiency are the 
experiments of Professor Aschaffenberg 
on four German beer-drinking typeset¬ 
ters, who in sixteen days of experiment— 
four days each—averaged 9 per cent 
more work and more pay on the days 
they drank nothing than on the days 
they drank one ounce. That is not 
“ moderate drinking ” but microscopic 
drinking—as much alcohol as is con¬ 
tained in two glasses of beer or less than 
one bottle of Greek wine. (See cut over.) 

For Efficiency and Success, Abstain. 

III. The Finger of Heredity. 

A man may be willing to fly the motto 
for himself, “ A short life and a happy 
one,” and risk both health and property 
for fuddle and fellowship but not many 
who are fathers or mothers, or expect 
to be, will be indifferent when shown 
incontrovertible proofs that drinkers 
have fewer and weaker children than 
abstainers. 

Prof. C. F. Hodge, of Clark University, 
Worcester, Massachusetts ( “Physiologi¬ 
cal Aspects of the Liquor Problem”), 
selected from a litter of spaniels two 
little brothers exactly alike in infancy 
and brought them up, one as an alcoholic 
and the other as a total abstainer, giving 
the former only a small quantity of 
alcohol with his food, about equivalent 
in proportion to what benighted parents 
often give their children in beer or light 
wine mixed with water. From another 
litter of spaniels they selected two little 
sisters exactly alike in infancy and 
brought them up in the same way, one 
as an alcoholic, the other as a total 
abstainer. When the four dogs were 
grown they were mated, the two alco¬ 
holics together, and the total abstainers 
together, and the process was repeated. 
The two mothers and the offspring were 
placed under close scientific observation. 
Extraordinary phenomena set in with the 
alcoholic mother. She experienced diffi¬ 


culties and accidents, suffered great trav¬ 
ail with pups and finally died in pupbirth 
with the fifth litter, a phenomena un¬ 
known before. Many of her offspring 
were born dead. Many of them died in 
infancy, and of those that survived only 
17.7 per cent, were not deformed or de¬ 
fective. The little abstaining mother had 
no such experience. She bore large lit¬ 
ters of pups, of which 90.5 per cent, were 
strong and healthy. Prof. Demme, of 
Berne, found almost the same propor¬ 
tion of normal offspring in the descend¬ 
ants of ten alcoholic families (17 per 
cent.) and ten temperate families (88.5 
per cent.). See Chart below. A witness 
to the consequence of alcoholism in the 
father is Dr. L. O. Fuller, who presents 
what he believes to be the cause of many 
cases of inebriety, or chronic alcoholism, 
which reach the stage where the victims 
are recognized as diseased and treated 
as such. In tracing the parentage of 
these persons, it is found that their 
fathers, three times as often as their 
mothers, were alcoholics. They have 
inherited a state of nervous irritability 
which makes them more susceptible to 
alcohol than were their parents before 
them. 


HOW ALCOHOL 
BLIGHTS CHILDHOOD 

INVESTIGATION OF TWENTY FAMILIES 

BY PROFESSOR DEMME. BERN. 1878-89 

CHILDREN OF TEN TEMPERATE I 

FAMILIES TOTAL 6t j 

50 NOR 

OOOOOOOOOO 
OOOOOOOOOO 
OOOOOOOOOO 
OOOOOOOOOO 
OOOOOOOOOO 

1 CHILDREN OF TEN INTEMPERATE 

1 FAMILIES. TOTAL 57 

MAL 10 

0 0 0 0 o 
o o o o o 

2 DWARFED ANl 

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> DEFORMED 10 

D D D D D 

D D D D D 

2 BACKWARD 

B B 

7 IDIOTIC 

II II II ! 

2 ST. VITUS DANCE 

s s 

5 EPILEPTIC 

E E E E E 

5 DIED IN 11 

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IV. The Finger of Patriotism. 

In this connection we quote as of pro¬ 
found significance a statement of the 
Crown Prince of Sweden at the opening 
of the Good Templar Summer Festival, 
Hessllholm, 1910: “That nation which 
is first to free itself from the injurious 
effects of alcohol will thereby attain a 
marked^ advantage over other nations in 
the amicable yet intensive struggle for 
existence. I hope that our country will 
be the one which will first understand 
and secure this advantage." 

Those words of the Crown Prince rep¬ 
resent the fingers of hygiene and effi¬ 
ciency and heredity and patriotism, and 
they chime with words of the German 
Emperor in Feb. 1911: “The nation 
which takes the smallest quantity of al¬ 
cohol will win the battles of the future.” 
Americans who have depended mostly 
on the argument of an intelligent self 
love in fighting the saloon as the foe of 
health and business prosperity should 
learn from the leaders in other lands the 
stronger grip of the arguments that bring 
in the force of heredity, patriotism and 
humanity. In France also the patriotic 
argument is foremost. Because France 
is a “ dying nation,” the government puts 
up posters (over) warning against tip¬ 
pling that falls short of drunkenness, 
“ for the future of the nation.” And the 
watchword of China’s unexampled tri¬ 
umph over opium has been, “ That China 
may be Strong.” 


Dr. J. H. Kellogg, before the European 
War, pictured the decay of nations in a 
stereopticon lecture by six trees dy¬ 
ing at the top. Bulgaria had the least 
dead wood, representing the fact that one 
person in every thousand in that country 
lives to pass the 100 year mark, and not 
a few live for half a century longer. The 
United States comes next, but with only 
one centenarian in 25,000. Then the rec¬ 
ord grows worse and worse Spain, 44,- 
OOO, France 190,000, England 200,000, 
Germany 700,000. It is not mere acci¬ 
dent that the nation whose favorite 
drink is buttermilk stands at the head, 
while the nation which of all these coun¬ 
tries is most given to beer drinking is 
the lowest in the group. 

Alcohol, however, is not alone respon¬ 
sible for race degeneracy. Sex abuses 
have done quite as much in the destruc¬ 
tion of nations; and sins of ignorance 
and of willful indulgence in eating must 
take a share of the blame, and also the 
habit-forming drugs that in less violent 
ways work with alcohol to undermine 
the health. 

V. The Finger of Race Degeneracy. 

Great Britain, too, takes up the pa¬ 
triotic argument, alarmed by the failure 
of 80 per cent of those who offered them¬ 
selves for the Boer War to pass the ex¬ 
amination, and puts up in a hundred 
British cities, “ by order of the city gov¬ 
ernment,” warning posters headed. 


We hope many will have charts in this leaflet reproduced in size that can be seen in a large 
auditorium. Let them be about a yard wide and three to four feet long, preferably on white oil 
cloth, using both sides, and mounted like a light map to hold in hand, one by one. They shoud 
be shown in Sundai"- schools and public schools and out of school; and after or in place of the 
addresses these elaflets should be distributed from house to house, by adult volunteers going two 
and two. The International Reform Buerau is raising a fund to have such documents put in 
half the homes of the United States—later of the world, four times a year. 









122 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


" ALCOHOLISM 
and Physical Degeneracy.” 

which adds to the patriotic argument 
the yet larger warning against race de¬ 
generacy. As Congressman Hobson 
shows in his great speech on alcohol as 
” The Great Destroyer,” degeneracy of 
the human race the world over is threat¬ 
ened in the widening markets of alcohol. 

The chief purpose of the Brewers* 
World Congress held in Chicago in 1911 
was to push the sale of beer in China, 
Korea, Japan and other lands that have 
been less cursed than the white races 
with this race poison. This beer exten¬ 
sion movement, should arouse all Chris¬ 
tian and all humane people to march in 
upon the revels of Alcohol and slay this 
foe of God and man. 

Sir Andrew Clark, physician to Queen 
Victoria, said that when he looked at the 
hospital wards, and saw that seven out of 
ten owed their diseases to alcohol, and 
when he thought of all the other evils 
wrought by drink, he felt impelled to 
give up his profession, ” to give up 
everything and go forth upon a holy 
crusade, preaching to all men, ‘ Beware 
of this enemy of the race.’ ” If we can¬ 
not give up everything to do this grand 


and necessary work, can we not give 
a little time, a little work, a little money, 
an earnest prayer, a few words, a good 
example, a temperance vote? 

Surely I need not say that the state 
should do more than warn the people 
against a traffic that imperils the nation. 

Scientific experiments at Yale, with 
others, have prompted President Hadley 
to say that if the American people knew 
what alcohol really is they would banish 
every saloon from the land. Why 
shouldn’t the churches take up that word 
of President Hadley and make known to 
all the fact, declared by Prof. C. F. 
Hodge of Clark University and others, 
that alcohol is the “ waste product ” of a 
microbe. 

It will require only the faithful teach¬ 
ing of the effects of alcohol on the brain 
to the generation now in Sunday schools 
and public schools to create a social 
conscience that will cause the Supreme 
Court, in accord with its own dictum that 
” No legislature can bargain away the 
public health or the public morals; the 
people themselves can not do it, much 
less their servants” (94 U. S. 645), to 
adopt the Artman decision that ail li¬ 
censes for the sale of intoxicating bever- 
ages are unconstitutional and void. 


ALCOHOLISM AND PHYSICAL DEGENERACY. 

" LIBERTY, EQUALITY, FRATERNITY.” 

Alcoholism is the chronic poisoning which results from the habitual use 
of alcohol, even when the latter would not produce drunkenness. 

It is an error to say that alcohol is necessary to workmen who engage in fatiguing labor; 
that it gives heart to work, or that it repairs strength. The artificial excitation which it 
produces gives place very quickly to nervous depression and feebleness. 

The habit of drinking entails disaffection from the family, forgetfulness of all duties to 
society, distaste for work, misery, theft and crime. It leads at the last to the hospital, for 
alcohol engenders the most varied maladies; paralysis, lunacy, disease of the stomach and liver, 
dropsy. It is one of the most frequent causes of tuberculosis. P'inally, it complicates and 
aggravates all acute maladies. Typhoid fever, pneumonia, erysipelas, which would be mild 
in the case of a sober man, quickly carry off the alcoholic drinker. The hygienic faults of 
parents fall upon their children. If the latter survive the first months they are threatened 
with idiocy or epilepsy, or, still worse, they are carried off a little later by tuberculosis, menin¬ 
gitis or phthisis. 

For the health of the individual, for the existence of the family, for the 
future of the nation, alcohol is one of the most terrible scourges. 

(The five paragraphs above are from posters put up by French city governments to check 
national decay that has led to deaths exceeding births, except that heading is from British 
posters, the French being “Alcoholism, Its Dangers.” What follows is from British Parlia¬ 
mentary Report on Physical Deterioration, prompted by failure of majority of candidates for 
enlistment in British Army to pass examinations. In consequence, British city governments 
post these extracts as a warning, not only in Great Britain as a cure but also in athletic 
Australia as a preventative. For one or other of these reasons such a warning should be 
posted in every city and town of the world, and read in the schools.) 

The continued use of alcohol, whether in form of beer, wine or spirits, 
even though not to the extent of drunkenness, often leads to chronic poisoning. 

Of 61,215 people the average deaths per year by insurance tables will be 1,000. Of 
61,215 liquor sellers, the death average is 1,642. Of 61,215 Rechabites (abstainers) the death 
average is 560. 

Sir Frederick Treves, Physician to King Edward, declares that alcohol is an insiduous 
poison, and should be subject to the same strict lirnitations as opium, morphia or strychnine, 
and that its supposed stimu.ating effects are delusive. 

Respectfully submitted for consideration of citizens by.Maj'Or. 

(Or it might be signed by health officer or superintendent of schools or put up in behalf 
of some cvic club. See also note over.) 




SCIENTIFIC TESTIMONY ON BEER 


123 


From Speech by Senator J. H. Gallinger, M. D., Congressional Record, Jan. 9, 1901 

of Leading Physicians. 

Ihe alarming growth of the use of beer 
among our people, and the spreading de¬ 


lusion among many who consider them¬ 
selves temperate and sober, that the 
encouragement of beer drinking is an 
enective way of promoting the cause of 
temperance and of aiding to stamp out the 
demon rum, impelled the Toledo Blade to 
send a representative to a number of the 
leading physicians of Toledo to obtain 
their opinions as to the real damage which 
indulgence in malt liquors does the victim 
of that form of intemperance. 

Every one is not only a gentleman of 
the highest personal character, but is a 
physician whose professional abilities have 
been severely tested, and received the 
stamp of the highest indorsement by the 
public and their professional brethren. 
More skilful physicians are not to be found 
anywhere. We have not selected those of 
known temperance principles. What they 
say of beer is not colored by any feeling 
for or against temperance, but is the cold, 
bare experience of men of science who 
know whereof they speak. 

A Beer Drinking City. 

Toledo is essentially, a beer drinking 
city. The German population is very 
large. Five of the largest breweries in the 
country are here. Probably more beer is 
drunk, in proportion to the population, 
than in any other city in the United States. 
The practice of these physicians is, there¬ 
fore, largely among beer drinkers, and 
they have had abundant opportunities to 
know exactly its bearings on health and 
disease. 

!^very one bears testimony that no man 
can drink beer safely, that it is an injury 
to any one who uses it in any quantity, 
and that its effect on the general health of 
the country has been even worse than that 
of whiskey. The indictment they with 
one accord present against beer drinking 
is simply terrible. 

The devilfish crushing a man in his long 
winding arms, and sucking his blood from 
his mangled body, is not so frightful an 
assailant as this deadly but insidious 
enemy, which fastens itself upon its vic¬ 
tim, and daily becomes more and more the 
wretched man’s master, and finally drag¬ 
ging him to his grave at a time when other 
men are in their prime of mental and 
bodily vigor. 

Beer Kills Quicker Than Other Liquor. 

Dr. S. H. Burgen, a practitioner 35 years, 
28 in Toledo, says: “I think beer kills 
quicker than any other liquor. My atten¬ 
tion was first called to its insidious effects 
when I began examining for life insurance. 


in an hour, and 24 hours in a day, and add 
I passed as unusually good risks five Ger¬ 
mans—young business men—who seemed 
in the best of health, and to have superb 
constitutions. In a few years I was 
amazed to see the whole five drop oflF, one 
after another, with what ought to have 
been mild and easily curable diseases. On 
comparing my experience with that of 
other physicians I found they were all 
having similar luck with confirmed beer 
drinkers, and my practice since has heaped 
confirmation on confirmation. 

“The first organ to be attacked is the 
kidneys; the liver soon sympathizes, and 
then comes, most frequently, dropsy or 
Bright’s disease, both certain to end fa¬ 
tally. Any physician, who cares to take 
the time, will tell you that among the 
dreadful results of beer drinking are lock¬ 
jaw and erysipelas, and that the beer 
drinker seems incapable of recovering from 
mild disorders and injuries not usually re¬ 
garded of a grave character. Pneumonia, 
pleurisy, fevers, etc., seem to have a first 
mortgage on him, which they foreclose 
remorselessly at an early opportunity. 

Beer Worse Than Whiskey. 

“ The beer drinker is much worse off 
than the whiskey drinker, who seems to 
have more elasticity and reserve power. 
Fie will even have deliriumn tremens; but 
after the fit is gone you will sometimes 
find good material to work upon. Good 
management may bring him around^ all 
right But whe.n a beer drinker gets into 
trouble it seems almost as if you have to 
recreate the man before you can do any¬ 
thing for him. I have talked this for 
years, and have had abundance of living 
and dead instances around me to support 
my opinions.” 

Beer Drinking Shortens Life 

Dr. S. S. Lungren, a leading homeo¬ 
pathic physician and surgeon, has prac¬ 
ticed in Toledo 25 years: “It is difficult to 
find any part of the confirmed beer drink¬ 
er’s machinery that is doing its work as 
it should. This is why their life cords 
snap off like glass rods when disease or 
accident gives them a little blow. Beer 
drinking shortens life. This is not a mere 
opinion; it is a well settled recognized 
fact. Physicians and insurance companies 
accept this as unquestionably as any other 
undisputed fact of science. The great 
English physicians decide that the heart’s 
action is increased 13 per cent.in its efforts 
to throw off alcohol introduced into the 
circulation. The result is easily figured 
out. The natural pulse-beat is, say, 76 per 
minute. If we multiply this by 60 minutes 


124 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


13 per cent,, we find that the heart has 
teen compelled to do an extra work during 
that time in throwing off the burden of a 
few drinks (4.8 ounces of alcohol) equal 
to 15.5 tons lifted one foot high.” 


Life Insurance Companies 
” The life insurance companies make a 
business of estimatng men’s lives, and can 
only make money by making correst esti¬ 
mates of whatever influences life. Here is 
•a table they use in calculating how long a 
normal, healthy man will probably live 
after a given age: 


Age Expectancy 
20 years, 41.5 years 
30 years, 34.4 years 
~40 years, 28.3 years 


Age Expectancy 
50 years, 20.2 years 
GO years, 13.8 years 
65 years, 11 years 


“ Now they expect a man otherwise 
bealthy, who is addicted to beer, will have 
his life shortened from 40 to 60 per cent. 
For instance, if he is 20 years old and does 
not drink beer, he may reasonably expect 
to reach the age of 61. If he is a beer 
drinker, he will probably not live to be 
over 40 or 45, and so on.” 


Beer Drinking and Longevity 

The President of the Connecticut Mu¬ 
tual Life Insurance Company—one of the 
oldest in the country—has for years been 
investigating the relation of beer drinking 
to_ longevity; or otherwise, whether beer 
drinkers are desirable risks to a life insur¬ 
ance company. 

He declared, as a result of a series of 
observations carried on among a selected 
group of persons who were habitual drink¬ 
ers of beer, that although for two or three 
years there was nothing remarkable, yet 
presently death began to strike, and then 
the mortality became astounding and uni¬ 
form in its manifestations. There was no 
mistaking it; the history was almost in¬ 
variable; robust, apparent health, full 
muscles, a fair outside, increasing weight, 
florid faces; then a touch of cold or a sniff 
of malaria, and instantly some acute dis¬ 
ease, with almost invariable typhoid symp¬ 
toms, was in violent action, and ten days 
or less ended it. It was as if the system 
had been kept fair on the outside, while 
within it was eaten to a shell, and at the 
first touch of disease there was utter col¬ 
lapse, every fibre was poisoned and weak. 
And this in its main features, varying in 
degree, has been his observation in beer 
drinking everywhere. It is peculiarly 
deceptive at first; it is thoroughly de¬ 
structive at the last. 


Beer Drinkers Unpromising Patients 
Dr. J. T. Woods: “The confirmed beer 
drinkers are especially unpromising pa¬ 
tients, all practical surgeons agree.” 

Dr. S. S. Lungren: “Alcohol invites at¬ 


tacks of disease, and makes recovery from 
any attack or injury difficult.” 

Dr. C. A. Kirkley: “Sickness is always 
more fatal in beer drinkers, and serious 
accidents are usually fatal to them.” 

Dr. S. H. Burgen: “Beer drinkers are 
absolutely the most dangerous class of 
subjects a surgeon can operate on. In¬ 
significant scratches are liable to develop 
a long train of dangerous troubles. Some¬ 
times delirium tremens results from a small 
hurt. It is dangerous for a beer dringer 
to even cut his finger. All surgeons hesi¬ 
tate to perform operations on a beer 
drinker that they would undertake with 
the greatest confidence on anyone else.” 

“A Little Circle of Doctors” 

Dr. S. S. Throne: “If you could drop 
into a little circle of doctors, when they 
are having a quiet, professional chat, you 
would hear enough in a few minutes to 
terrify you as to the work of beer. One 
will say, ‘What’s become of So-and-So? 
I haven’t seen him around lately?’ ‘Oh, 
he's dead.’ ‘Dead! What was the mat¬ 
ter?’ ‘Beer.’ Another will say, ‘I’ve just 
come from Bank’s. I am afraid its about 
my last call on him, poor fellow.’ ‘What’s 
the trouble?’ ‘Oh, he’s been a regular beer 
drinker for years.’ A third will remark 

how - has just gone out like a candle 

in a draft of wind. ‘Beer’ is the reason 
given. And so on, till half a dozen physi¬ 
cians have mentioned fifty recent cases 
where apparently strong, healthy men, at 
a time of life when they should be in their 
prime, have suddenly dropped into the 
grave. To say they are habitual beer 
drinkers is sufficient explanation to any 
physician.” 

Beer Drinking Produces Rheumatism 
Dr. W. T. Ridenour: “Beer drinking 
produces rheumatism by producing chronic 
congestion and ultimately degeneration^ of 
the liver, thus interfering with its function 
by which the food is elaborated and fitted 
for the sustenance of the body.” 

Dr. S. FI. Burgen: “All beer drinkers 
have rheumatism, more or less, and no one 
can recover from it as long as he drinks 
beer. Notice how a beer drinker walks 
about stiff on his heels, without any of the 
natural elasticity and spring from the toes 
and ball of the foot that a healthy man 
should have. That is because the beer 
increases the lithia deposits about the 
smaller joints.” 

Beer Cripples the Liver 
Dr. S. H. Burgen: “The first effect on 
the liver is to congest and enlarge it. 
Then follows a low grade of inflamation 
and subsequent contraction of the cap¬ 
sules, producing ‘hob-nailed’ or drunkard’s 
liver, the surface covered with little lumps 


This leaflet 35c. per 100, International Eeform Bureau, 20G Pennsylvania Ave., s. e., Washington, D. C. 

“World Book of Temperance,” $1.00. 





SCIENTIFIC TESTIMONY ON BEER 


that look^ like nail heads on the soles of 
shoes. 1 his develops dropsy. The con¬ 
gestion of the liver clogs up all the springs 
of the body, and makes all sorts of exer¬ 
tion as difficult and labored as it would be 
to run a clock, the wheels of which were 
covered with dirt and gum.” 

Liable to Die of Pneumonia 

Dr. W. T. Ridenour: “Beer drinkers are 
peculiarly liable to die of pneumonia, 
riieir vital power, their power of resist 
ance, is so lowered that they are liable to 
drop off from any form of acute disease, 
such as fevers, pneumonia, etc. As a rule 
when a beer drinker takes the pneumonia, 
he dies. 

“ My first patient was a saloon keeper, as 
fine a looking man physically as I had ever 
sden—tall, well built, about thirty-five, 
with clear eyes, florid complexion, muscles 
well developed. He had an attack of 
pneumonia in the lower lobe of the right 
lung, a simple, well defined case, which I 
regarded very hopefully. Doctors are con¬ 
fident of saving nineteen out of twenty 
such case. I told my partner so in the 
evening. To my surprise he said quietly, 
‘He’ll die.’ I asked what made him think 
so. ‘He is a beer drinker,’ he answered. 
My patient began to recover from the at¬ 
tack on the lower lobe. Suddenly the 
disease lighted up in the middle lobe. 
Finally it attacked the other lung, and my 
patient succumbed.” 

Dropsy Induced by Beer Drinking 
Dr. Al. H. Parmalee, physician and sur¬ 
geon twelve years in Toledo, says: “The 
majority of saloon keepers die from dropsy, 
arising from kidney and liver diseases, in¬ 
duced by beer drinking. Aly experience 
has been that saloon keepers and men 
working around breweries are very liable 
to these diseases. When one of those ap¬ 
parently stalwart, beery fellows is attacked 
by a disorder that would not be regarded 
as at all dangerous in a person of ordinary 
constitution, or even a delicate, weakly 
child or woman, he is liable to drop off like 
an over-ripe apple from a tree. You are 
never sure of him a minute. He may not 
be dangerously sick today, and tomorrow 
be in his shroud. Alost physicians, like 
myself, dread being called upon to take 
charge of a sick man who is an habitual 
beer drinker. The form of Bright’s dis¬ 
ease known as the swollen or large white 
kidney is much more frequent among beer 
drinkers than any other class of people.” 

Insanity Caused by Beer Drinking 
Dr. S. S. Lungren: “The brain and its 
membranes suffer severely, and after irri¬ 
tation and inflammation comes dullness 
and stupidity. There is no question in my 
mind that many brain diseases and cases 
of insanity are caused by excessive beer 
drinking.” 


Dr. C. A. Kirkley: “Under its influence* 
the mental powers are more inactive than 
the physical. There is hardly a single 
cause that operates more powerfully in the 
production of insanity; and not only that, 
but it excites the action of other causes 
that may be present.” 

Bright’s Disease Due to Beer 

Dr. W. T. Ridenour: “I have no doubt 
the rapid spread of Bright’s disease is 
largely due to beer drinking. I have all 
ways believed that Bayard Taylor fell a 
victim to the German beer that he praised 
so highly. He died of Bright’s disease at 
GO, when he should have lived, with his 
constitution, to a ripe old age. He went 
just as beer drinkers are going all the 
time and everywhere.” 

Dr. C. A. Kirkley: “ I believe that forty- 
nine out of fifty cases of chronic Bright’s 
disease are directly produced by it. I have 
never met with a case in which the patient 
has not been intemperate to a greater or 
less degree. The proportion may be too 
high, but that is certainly my experience. 
Air. Christian, a celebrated author, states 
that three-fourths to four-fifths of the 
cases met with in Edinburgh were in 
habitual drunkards.” 

An Artificial Prop 

Dr. C. A. Kirkley, in constant practice 
in Toledo 15 years, says: “I do not be¬ 
lieve the healthy organism needs an arti¬ 
ficial prop to sustain it. Depression be¬ 
low the standard of health always follows 
just in proportion as the system is stimu¬ 
lated above that standard. Every physi¬ 
cian is familiar with cases in which nerv¬ 
ous w'ear and tear in an active life has been 
kept up by stimulants without apparent 
loss of power for years. Bodily and men¬ 
tal vigor, however, suddenly fail. The re¬ 
peated application of the stimulus that the 
exertion might be prolonged has really 
expended the power of the nervous sys¬ 
tem, and prepared him for more complete 
prostration. The temporary advantage 
was purchased at a great cost. The 
greater the expenditure of nervous power 
by the use of stimulants, the more com¬ 
plete the exhaustion.” 

Children of Drunkards—Idiots 
Dr. C. A. Kirkley: “ Plutarch says, 
‘One drunkard begets another;’ and Aris¬ 
totle, ‘Drunken women bring forth chil¬ 
dren like unto themselves.’ A report was 
made to the legislature of Alassachusetts 
I think by Dr. Howe, on idiocy. He had 
learned the habits of the parents of 300 
idiots, and 145, nearly half, are reported 
as known to be habitual drunkards, show¬ 
ing the enfeebled constitution of the chil¬ 
dren of drunkards. I have in mind an 
instance where children born to the mother 
begotten when the father was intoxicated, 
all died within eight month of birth. They 


126 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION. 


would have recovered, had they not had 
the enfeebled constitution inherited from 
their intemperate father. Instances are 
recorded where both parents were intoxi¬ 
cated at the time of conception, and the 
result was an idiot. There is not a doubt 
but that inebriety not only makes more 
destructive whatever taint may exist, but 
impairs the health and natural vigor for 
remote generations.” 

Dr. A. McFarland: “That ‘the inquities 
of the fathers are visited upon the chil¬ 
dren;’ that ‘the fathers have eaten sour 
grapes and the children’s teeth are set on 
edge,’ are truths that no Scripture is 
needed to teach. In other words, he who 
sins through physical excess does not do 
half the harm to himself that he does to 
the inhertors of his blood. The penalty 
must be paid as sure as there is seed time 
and harvest. 

“ It is your stout old hero, who goes to 
bed every night with liquor enough under 
his belt to fuddle the brains of a half 
dozen ordinary men, and yet lives out his 
three-score and ten, that will be found at 
the head of the stock that pour into the 
world, generation after generation, such a 


crop of lunatics, epileptics, eccentrics, and 
inebriates as we often see. The impunity 
wdth which one so constituted will violate 
all physical laws gets its set-off in a suc¬ 
ceeding generation, when the great har¬ 
vest begins.” 

Dr. J. T. Woods: “That beer is foreign 
to nature’s demand is plainly evident. 
The whole organism at once sets about 
its removal. Every channel through 
which it can be got rid of is brought into 
play, and does not cease till the last trace 
is gone. Reaching a certain end depends 
only on the frequency of the repetition. 
The whole is made up of the parts; every 
drink counts one. These ‘ones’ added to¬ 
gether make the wreck; to secure this re¬ 
sult it is only necessary to make the sin¬ 
gle numbers sufficient. Each leaves its 
footprints in one way or another; and 
the idea that, because you stop before 
you stagger, the system takes no note of 
the damaging material you put into it is 
a ruinous delusion.” 

Dr. S. H. Burgen: “I have told you the 
frozen truth—cold, calm, scientific facts, 
such as the profession everywhere recog¬ 
nizes as absolute truths. I do not regard 
beer drinking as safe for any one.” 


THE BREWERS’ BIG HOSSES CAN’T RUN OVER ME 



—North American. 

Uncle Sam will say, “Kaiser’s Big Brewers Can’t Run Over Me.’’ when evidence of the “Invisible 
Government of the Pro-German Brewers’ Trust is uncovered. Senate investigation beginning- as this 
book goes to pres^s. The gun is the Senate Judiciary Committee and the ammunition is the car load of 
evidence against brewers trust in custody of United States Court at Pittsburgh. Ket Sovereign People 
demand that the brewers shall be halted m their spy system and political submarine campai^ aga^Sst 
“dry statesmen and “dry’’ business men, by use of that evidence. ^ ^ againsx 



The new “bone dry” era makes it imperative to magnify temperance lessons in all 
Sunday schools and public schools and colleges by such helps as this book provides. 


WORLD BOOK OF TEMPERANCE 

BY DR. and MRS. WILBUR F. CRAFTS. 

Octavo, 416 pp., illustrated, cloth, $1.00, postpaid. 

This book aims to condense in small compass for moral leaders in all lands, espe¬ 
cially for teachers in the British Empire and the United States, the latest scientific 
discoveries as to the harmfulness of even moderate drinkers of beer and wine, with 
lessons of Scripture and history, that the Sunday-school temperance lessons and the 
scientific lessons of public school teachers may both be freshened by illustrations from 
related branches of the subject. Its full indexes adapt it for cyclopedic use. 

WHAT IS SAID OF THE BOOK. 


Christian Advocate, New York; “The material 
is gathered from an immense range of reading, is 
put in striking lan^age, and forms a magazine of 
destructive explosives with which to undermine 
the power of the saloon.” 

Northern Christian Advocate, S 3 rracuse: 
valuable thesaurus for any temperance worker.” 


Christian Intelligencer, New York; “Covers 
the whole field of temperance, dealing thoroughly 
with topics of special importance.” 

Journal of Education, Boston; “Live material 
to aid any one in preparing an address on temper¬ 
ance, Biblical, historical and scientific matter is 
presented in a number of forms that are decidedly 
telling. There is not a juiceless paragraph in the 
entire book.” 

Evangelical Messenger, Cleveland; “It is dif¬ 
ferent from any book on temperance that we have 
ever read. Its arrangement is unique, the pre¬ 
sentation of the subjects is fair, the arguments 
convincing.” 


Christian Endeavor World, Boston; A per¬ 
fect arsenal of weapons for Sunday school work 
ers, teachers, Endeavorers.” 


The Watchman, Boston; “Dr. and Mrs. Crafts, 
who have been for years in the forefront of Sun¬ 
day school and reformatory work, have crammed 
this little manual full of facts, figures, and sug¬ 
gestions for teachers. It is a rnost effective PH.c® 
of richly loaded, rapid-fire artillery and its dis¬ 
tribution to every soldier in the ‘Holy War would 
be a blessing.” 


Lutheran World, Dayton; “Its material is 
snlendidly arranged and will be most helpful to 
all Sunday school workers, Bible teachers and 
reformers.” 

Herald and Presbyter, Cincinnati; “A remark¬ 
ably valuable volume.” 

Band of Hope Chronicle, London: “Band of 
Hope workers and teachers in Sunday school can 
not fail to find many helps m this book. 


Intercollegiate Statesman, Chicago; “No bet¬ 
ter book for all kinds of church temperance work, 
and valuable for speakers. 


National Temperance Advocate, New York: 
“Teachers of public schools as well as Sunday 
schools, preachers also, and all temperance work¬ 
ers will need this up-to-date arsenal.” 

The Standard, Chicago; “Packed full of telling 
up-to-date illustrations.” 

Scientific Temperance Journal, Boston; “The 
scientific data is up-to-date and interesting." 


Daily Witness, Montreal; “A very practical 
help for all temperance workers.” 

Good Templars’ Watchword, Birmingham 
[Coun. Jos. Malins, J. P., P. G. W. C. T., 
Editor]; “A remarkable volume—a veritable 
encyclopedia of information on every phase of 
the Temperance movement. It includes an 
analysis of Scripture on the wine question and a 
series of Bible Temperance lessons. It also gives 
much information on liquor and prohibitory laws 
in^ the United States and other lands. It con¬ 
tains a great aggregation of the best testimonies 
on the moral, social, and physiological bearings 
of the drink question. It is perhaps the fullest 
compendium available. It is illustrated, and has 
blackboard lessons for the young.” 

Free Church Chronicle, London; “Gives in¬ 
formation on every side of temperance work.” 

Temperance Chronicle [Church of England], 
London; “The Englishman can extract many 
valuable and interesting points.” 

The Christian, London; “A wonderful repertory 
of material for temperance lessons. The chrono¬ 
logical index will be valued by all who wish to 
keep before them the progress of the movement, 
and many an address will be made more forcible 
by these pages.” 

Mrs. Zillah Foster Stevens, Sec. Temperance 
Department, International Sunday School Asso¬ 
ciation; “It is by far the best help for Sunday 
School workers in the temperance line that I 
have ever seen. I shall consider that I am under 
obligations to do all I can to make our Sunday 
School workers acquainted with it.” 


Order above and other books by Dr. and Mrs. Crafts (send for full list), through 
International Reform Bureau, 206 Pexmsylvania Ave., s- e., Washington, D. C. 



Books Ly Rev. Wilbur F. Crafts, Pb. D. 

(These books nearly all written or revised in 20th century.) 

^Illustrated Bible Readings, Octavo, Cloth, 416 pp., 76 Tissot pictures in 
colors, $1.00, postpaid. 11th thousand. 

*Bible in Schools Plans of Many Lands. Octavo, 224 pp., 50 cts., postpaid. 

*World Book of Temperance. (Lessons, Biblical, Historical Scientific), 
Octavo, 416 pp.. Illustrated. Cloth, $1.00. 6th thousand. 

Intoxicating Drinks and Drugs in alL Lands and Times. The Temperance 
Argument on a Missionary Background. (Mrs. Crafts and Misses Mary 
and Margaret W. Leitch joint authors). 12 mo. 288 pp. Cloth, 35 cts.; 
10th thousand. Out of print. Funds needed to publish for missionary 
uses. 

^Internationalism. 96 pp. 25 cts. paper; cloth, 50 cents. 3d thousand. 

*Patriotic Studies, Enlarged Edition, Octavo, 288 pp.. Cloth 50 cts. Gives 
cream of Reform Arguments in Congress on the Sabbath, temperance, 
gambling, impurity, Mormonism, divorce, prize fighting, immigration, 
referendum, election of Senators by the people, etc. 

Quarter Century of Reform Progress. Quarto, pp. 384. This puts Patriotic 
Studies into better binding with 96 pp. added. 75 cts., postpaid. 

Practical Christian Sociology. 12 mo. Cloth, 512 pp., $1.00, 1907, 4th 
thousand. 

^‘The Civil Sabbath. The Sabbath Surveyed from Patriotic and Humanitarian 
standpoints. Paper, 5 cts. 5th thousand. 

The March of Christ Down the Centuries. Historic Survey of all Reforms, 
with 20th Century Statistics. 128 pp., cloth, 25 cts; paper 10 cts. 8th 
thousand. Out of print. 

Successful Men of Today and What They Say of Success. Based on Replies 
of 500 Living Men of Eminence as to How They Attained Success, With 
Study of Integrity in Business. Illustrated. 12 mo., 288 pp. Cloth $1. 
45th thousand. 

Plain Uses of the Blackboard. 12 mo. Cloth, $1. 11th thousand. Many 
blackboard lessons on temperance; also on all parts of the Bible. 

*One set of starred books, best edition of each, for $2.75 carriage prepaid. 

THE INTERNATIONAL REFORM BUREAU, 

206 Pennsylvania Avenue, s. e., Washington, D. C. 


NEW PAGES ADDED TO WORLDWIDE PROHIBITION EDITION OF 

“WHY DRY?” 

By Wilbur F. Crafts, Ph. D. Published by International Reform Bureau, 206 
Pennsylvania Ave., s. e., Washington, D. C. These extra pages 20 cents, postpaid. 
Whole book 50 cents, postpaid. $35 per 100 copies, carriage postpaid. 


(This is a hint in the rough how argument for total abstinence and prohibition 
might be adapted to present situation in China. It is also pertinent to other lands.) 


Will China Become the Dump of Our Cast-Off Breweries? 

At a banquet in Shanghai, given in honor of President C. W. Eliot, of Harvard 
University, who was touring the world, two missionaries were conspicuous as the only 
guests that did not join in the wine drinking. An American lawyer sitting next, chided 
them for what he regarded as unnecessary self-denial. One of the missionaries replied: 
“You may have the jollier time tonight, but I will be the better man tomorrow.” 
The lawyer laughed him to scorn, but President Eliot turned on the lawyer and said, in 
substance: “ Modern science is against you. Recent experiments show that when a man 
drinks he borrows from his future efficiency.” 

(See pp. 81, 82, 61, 118.) 

Liquor Traffic Imperils Democracy. 

That brings us to a still more fundamental reason for excluding liquors from a 
country, especially a democracy, namely, that the liquor traffic wherever it goes forms 
an unholy league of commercialized vices and commercialized politics, and then, by 
secret manipulation, terrifying business men, influencing politicians, secures in many 
cases the absolute control of government, destroying democracy as surely as it is 
destroyed by personal autocracy. 

On the Delaware and Lackawanna Railroad an accident occurred which caused 
the death of forty people and much destruction of property, for which the railroad had 
to pay heavy damages. In consequence, drinking by employees was forbidden. But 
the United States Brewers Association, as was shown in the Senate investigation, put a 
boycott on the railroad because of this requirement of abstinence. The Blackstone 
Hotel, in Chicago, was boycotted because it closed on Sunday in obedience to law. 
Hundreds of cases of secret and criminal interference with civic rights of citizens and 
officials are shown by the Senate investigation. The stenographic report of these 
revelations will be sent to the democracies of Europe, old and new, to prove that 
THE TOLERATION OF THE LIQUOR TRAFFIC BRINGS SOMETHING 
WORSE THAN HYGIENIC AND ECONOMIC INJURY—THE NULLIFICA¬ 
TION OF DEMOCRACY ITSELF. Senator Sheppard well said in a letter to the 
International Reform Bureau: “Worldwide prohibition should go with worldwide 
democracy, making the latter safe and strong and pure.” 


See China in Alphabetical Index at end of book. 






130 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION 


It is said by some that China does not need prohibition, having never developed 
such a degree of drunkenness as is common among white races. A conclusive answer 
is the case of India, which was even less given to drink than China a few years ago, 
being fortified against it by three total-abstinence religions—Hindu, Buddhist and 
Mohammedan. But through British promotion of the traffic for profit and revenue, 
the drinking by natives in India has increased by leaps and bounds. It will be so in 
China, no doubt, if the cast-off brewers of the United States are allowed to introduce 
not only their machinery but their machinations into China. “ Prevention is better than 
cure.” China should at least prohibit any building or owning or operating of breweries 
or distilleries by foreigners. And when sentiment is sufficiently developed there should 
be prohibition of liquor selling. 

China should not allow herself to be fooled with the delusion that alcohol in 
beer and wine is relatively harmless. The same amount of alcohol may be imbibed in 
one pint of wine, two pints of beer, or three ounces of whiskey. The form in which the 
alcohol is taken is nothing more than three suits of clothes for the same burglar. 

I ; The United States Has Tried Everything and Only Prohibition Helps. 

The United States has suffered infinitely in loss of life and property from a 
hundred years of experimenting with low license and high license and government 
ownership and disinterested management, and after all these experiments, which should 
suffice for the whole world, has settled down to the fact that the only laws that even 
reduce the evils of the liquor traffic are the various forms of prohibition. Local option, 
though helpful, has proved too local and too optional. State-wide prohibition has 
helped yet more but has been much hindered by anarchistic liquor invasions from 
“wet” border States. Why should other nations repeat these experiments? Let them 
strike at once for nationwide bone-dry prohibition, or at least for State or Provincial 
prohibition. 

Even Moderate Use of Mild Liquors Increases Social Diseases. 

The fact has been brought out all through this war that venereal diseases, which 
the public has learned at last are the worst of all, are related closely, as effect to 
cause, to the use of intoxicating liquors, especially wine and beer. It has been shown 
that it is not the man who is drunk on hard liquors that is most in danger of these 
diseases, but the man who is slightly exhilerated by wine or beer. Grit, of Australia, 
reports that Lieut. Col. Thomas W. Gibbard, testifying before British Royal Commis¬ 
sion on Venereal Diseases, called attention to a reduction in beer consumption of 38 
per cent., which was followed by a reduction of 45 per cent in venereal diseases, and 
58 per cent, in alcoholism. This is but one of a multitude of proofs of the same fact. 

There is scarcely an evil that prohibition does not decrease, whether in the body 
or the body politic. The world is planning to prohibit future wars by international 
action. After a few more national prohibitions of intoxicants, we may hope a world 
congress will prohibit for all lands then “wet” an evil long since declared by Gladstone 
more harmful to the world than “ war, pestilence and famine.” 

As the United States, having prohibited drink, is now strengthening its prohibition 
of opiates, so China, having nobly prohibited dope, should also prohibit drink. 


The International Reform Bureau asks the co-operation of all Americans evm-v 
where to whom this message comes m petitioning Congress to embodv i^fho L J 
prohibition enforcement law a declaration that all Americans in Chin^a imrIr 
toriality are subject to national prohibition as to all other imtional 

triable for violations in the American Court in Chh 'a American laws, and 


131 


PROHIBITION FOR THE DEMOCRACIES OF EUROPE 

newfcc\acreVof centrMEur'opeT P^hibition argument in the 


Prohibition for the Democracies of Europe 

Surely it must mean much to you, the new democracies of Europe, that in the 
United States, whose President uttered that great phrase “the self determination of 
peoples, which was your north star of liberty when the war had scarcely passed its 
midnight, national prohibition for the demobilization period has been followed by 
ratification of national constitutional prohibition. 

The unselfish and effective participation of the United States in a war whose 
purpose was to make the world safe for democracies however small and weak, has 
confuted those who have said that Americans are wholly dominated by commercialism, 
and you are therefore ready to give due weight to the prohibition verdict as that of a 
sane democracy which for more than a century has made sincere experiments with 
low license, high license, government ownership, and disinterested management, and 
has fully concluded that “bone dry” prohibition and total abstinence, with no excep¬ 
tions for beer and wine in either case, is the only effective remedy for the admitted 
evils of the drink habit and the drink traffic. 

Retail statistics of improvements in towns and States under prohibition are hardly 
necessary, though abundant (pp. 70-87, 110-114). 

The wholesale argument for prohibition is THAT AN INTELLIGENT PEOPLE, 
AFTER TRYING ALL THE REMEDIES THAT ARE NOW PROPOSED ELSE¬ 
WHERE AS SUBSTITUTES FOR PROHIBITION, HAS CAST THEM ALL 
ASIDE FOREVER BY PUTTING PROHIBITION INTO THE NATIONAL 
CONSTITUTION, FROM WHICH IT WILL BE PRACTICALLY IMPOSSIBLE 
TO DISLODGE IT, FOR THAT WOULD INVOLVE A TURNING BACK OF 
THE TIDES OF MORAL PROGRESS IN THREE FOURTHS OF THE STATES. 

The greatest of established democracies has banished the traffic and use of beer, 
wine, and stronger drinks. What good reason can be given why all democracies 
should not do likewise? On the other hand the reasons why they should do the same 
include, besides the argument that prohibition promotes health and industry, the 
higher patriotic argument, that only by prohibition can a democracy escape from the 
secret domination of the liquor interests. 

The International Reform Bureau, of Washington, D. C., is making arrangements 
for the translation into many tongues of a digest of the Senate investigation of the 
brewers’ political plots in the United States which connect up with similar plots by 
similar organizations in France and Great Britain. Now that the world is rid of 
Hun autocracy, the greatest menace to democracy remaining is this liquor domination 
in politics. Britain at the Peace Conference will claim to have managed her colonics 
for the good of both parties. The one conspicuous refusal to do that has been the 
debauchery of natives of Africa, and even of India, where good politics as well as good 
morals should have suggested consideration for three total-abstinence religions. The 
explanation is that the liquor power in politics, “ King Alcohol’s rule,” is hardly a 
limited monarchy. He certainly is not in either France or Britain a king that 


See Europe in Alphabetical Index at end of book. 





133 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION 


“reigns but does not rule/’ Dr. Saleeby said, when Lloyd George's war prohibition 
declaration failed to become law: “We are no longer ruled by King and Parliament, 
but are a brewer-ruled nation." 

The wine and brandy interests have not only dominated French politics but also 
reached out and vetoed Finland prohibition through threats to refuse loans to Russia, 
and in the contest for war prohibition in the United States the strong hand of the 
French liquor power put on the brakes. 

In the United States the liquor power in politics was able to defeat war prohibition 
twice when public opinion was about to be crystalized in a law of Congress, and so 
it came to pass that when we reached the period of demobilization and reconstruction 
in November, 1918, war prohibition had been placed seven and a half months away—for 
which many a young soldier will pay in a ruined life and many a community in 
bloody riots. 

"THE LIQUOR BUSINESS," SAYS THE CHICAGO TRIBUNE, “HAS 
BEEN A FAITHFUL ALLY OF EVERY VICIOUS ELEMENT IN AMERICAN 
LIFE; IT HAS PROTECTED CRIMINALS; IT HAS FOSTERED SOCIAL 
EVILS; AND IT HAS BRIBED POLITICIANS AND LEGISLATURES" 

The supreme peril of the liquor traffic for smaller republics is seen in the humilia¬ 
tion it has put upon the three best democracies of the world. It would be madness 
not to see also their supreme fault and avoid it. 

If I were asked to name the worst work of the drink curse I should not point to 
the drunkard nor to a victim of delirium tremens but I should point to the two best 
democracies in the world and their two greatest men, and show how the liquor power 
in politics had through those two greatest men of our age saved the liquor traffic from 
the people’s wrath when the waste of food and fuel and transportation and money and 
man power jeopardised the issues of our great war in those crucial hours when we 
fought with our backs to the wall. 

The United States alone of the three has thrown off its greatest oppressor. We 
can get little benefit from our tardy investigation of the brewers. It is but a 
revelation of the devices of a foe already sentenced to death. But to all other democ¬ 
racies, old and new, the Senate investigation shows clearly the treasonable methods 
by which an active foe will control their politics in his own interest if not banished 
by prohibition. 

A Lesson From Russia. 

As Russia’s first act, on declaring war, was to strike down the vodka foe in the 
rear by prohibition, so the first act of the new democracies should be to banish this 
secret foe, that government by the brewers for the brewers may not cause “ govern¬ 
ment of the people, by the people, for the people to perish from the earth." 

Russia’s prohibition has been eclipsed by the prevailing anarchy, but no one can 
blot out the unanswerable argument for prohibition of that wonderful first year, when 
the Russian people deposited more in one month in the savings banks than in the 
whole preceding “ wet ’’ year, with such other benefits that the Chancellor of the 
Russian Exchequer said: “RUSSIA WITHOUT VODKA AND WITH WAR IS 
BETTER OFF THAN RUSSIA WITH VODKA AND WITHOUT WAR." It is 
generally conceded that Russia would never have thrown off Czarism if it had not 
first thrown off vodka. The reverse is true, that a democracy in which drink drowns 
aspiration is likely to go back to autocracy when a man on horseback, of strong per¬ 
sonality, determines to be master. A monarchy may go on with a drunken people, but 
many drunken republics are in the graveyard of dead nations. 


PROHIBITION FOR THE DEMOCRACIES OF EUROPE 


A Warning From Germany. 


United States and Russia beckon new republics to prohibition by 
TT n ermanys fate points the same way. Years ago, Miss Frances E. Willard 
leader of the World's Woman’s Christian Temperance Union, when speaking 
PfKi soaking themselves with beer even while they wrote commentaries on the 

incongruity of the two acts, said: “TO THEM 

the arrest of thought has not come.” 


Surely, this war should bring “the arrest of thought” to all beer-drinking 
countries by its exhibition of the stolid cruelty to which a whole nation can be brought 
by beer drinking from childhood. Scientists tell us that “ every drop of beer kills a 
cell and the cells destroyed are the most precious cells at the top of the brain, the 
latest apple blossoms, so to speak, that civilization adds to the savage brain, unselfish¬ 
ness and justice and conscience. When these are blasted by alcohol’s affinity for these 
most liquid nerve tissues, what is left is the old brutal savage brain of the days when 
pagan white savages roamed “the Black Forest.” This is not the whole explanation 
of German cruelty, perpetrated by soldiers but glorified by professors and preachers 
also. German infidelity played its part, and a false education did its share. But the 
beer garden was unquestionably one of the influences that, first of all, made it possible 
to keep a people second to none in education, in the political nursery, under the care 
of kings and queens; and then made it possible for the whole German people to 
determine to despotize over all other races. 


In the United States it has been fully shown that the brewers, mostly German, 
tore up American laws as “scraps of paper” and attempted despotic control of politics 
in their own selfish interest, and at the same time sent money to Germany, even after 
the Lusitania murders; and sought by secret intrigues to prevent the United States 
from entering the war to rid sea and land of such piracy. 


War-Devastated Europe Can Not Afford the Wasteful Drink Traffic. 


Another mighty reason for prohibition in all the fraternal democracies of the 
world is that millions are starving and we can not afford now nor for years to come 
to waste food and fuel and transportation and man power by making and selling and 
drinking liquors. Almost every foreign nation is asking the United States for food and 
gifts or loans, which can be spared only by sacrifice or risk. 


Is it fair, when America has given up alcoholic beverages in large part because 
the war has shown the wastefulness of drink, to waste food and money in self-indulgence 
instead of using the surplus for feeding and rebuilding our war-devastated world? 

There was much of human interest and a powerful home defense argument in the 
description given in Philadelphia North American of the near riot among workmen, 
mostly from central Europe, that were cut off from their saloon resorts when a five-mile 
dry zone was put about the Frankford Arsenal in that city to protect the government 
workers. During the bedlam a woman strong of mein and muscle appeared She 
forced a way through the crowd and grasped a man—“her man”—by the arm: 

“Get on home, you drunken loafer,” she cried. “You’ve had enough this night. 


“ One drink—may be two—is all right for a working man, said a man who looked on 
while he quietly smoked. “ But saloon no good for married man. Wife and children 
they get no clothes—no shoes. All go in drink. Some say no right to close. Maybe 
so—maybe not. Me no drink. Me got food in house.” 


134 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION 


Even Moderate Drinking Hinders 
Self-Determination. 

Address at Dantzig in 1919 by Professor Thomas G. Masaryk, Now President of the 

Czecho-Slovak Republic. 

I come from an alcohol-drenched part of Moravia, the Moravian Wallachei. Any 
one who has had the opportunity of observing the workings of mass-alcoholism as it 
obtains there, will understand how to judge excuses and palliations. Drinking or not 
drinking signifies today a decisive choice between two wholly different ways of looking 
at life. Alcoholism stands for a chronic process of degeneration of the whole interior 
life, and represents, obviously, a sub-ethical and anti-ethical state of individual and of 
society. 

We demand energy of men today. We wish to be and to have men of strong wills. 
In earlier days this was not so. Diligence and endurance and especially obedience and 
belief, i. e., belief in others, in the leading few, were required and preached. But the 
modern man must determine his own course, must control himself and assist in the 
systematic transformation of our complicated social life. Courage and initiative— 
these are the watchwords of the reform-hungry present. Self-determination and self- 
control are the great demands of the modern ethic, and by this ethic alcoholism is 
judged and condemned. For it weakens, superficializes and deteriorates the power of 
apprehension, undermines the capacity for thinking, endangers the activities of the 
fancy by stimulating a bizarre and indistinct phantasmagoria, weakens will and the 
sense of accountability. 

No man has a natural craving for alcohol poison. Especially should the educated 
give the example. In the present stage of our scientific knowledge about alcohol, a 
physician, teacher or educator who tolerates drinking commits a crime. It is incumbent 
on the educated and leading circles to destroy the alcohol superstition, theoretically by 
enlightenrtient of the people, and practically by abstinence. 

Modern investigation indubitably teaches that drinking corrupts the sex life of our 
day. Alcoholism and prostitution are the chief factors in the degradation of nations. 
Even moderate drinking of the parent, if continued, is paid for by the child. The herit¬ 
age from grosser alcoholism is naturally the more dangerous. “Honour thy father and 
mother.” Certainly! But today we must add, “guard and respect the soul of thy 
child.” 

It is the duty of every thoughtful man to co-operate actively in the regeneration 
of his people. The cost of alcohol in human life far exceeds that of war and the victims 
of alcoholism do not die out. They drag miserably through a sick life and transmit 
their decay to the following generations. We in Austria complain of the cost of 
militarism and spend three times as much on alcohol. In Germany one-third of the 
expenditure for food goes for this unnecessary, injurious, corrupting liquor. 

Alcholism and prostitution are the chief factors in the degeneration of nations. 
The efforts for the regeneration of the human race on the part of the most important 
thinkers, from Rousseau to Wagner, will be finally turned into practical channels by 
the anti-alcohol movement. It is not merely a concern of mechanical abstinence but 
of the progress of mankind to a higher development and to higher ideals. 


PROHIBITION FOR LATIN AMERICAS 


135 


, ^ the rough, of how the argument for total abstinence and 

prohibition might be introduced in Spain and Spanish Americas.) 


Prohibition For Latin Americas 

A world map of prohibition in black and white, (p. 63) published during Russia’s 
first year of national prohibition—the first year of national prohibition anywhere- 
showed more than half the world white (p. 63). Russia’s prohibition made more than 
half of Europe white, and more than half of Asia. India was represented on the map as 
white because of its three prohibition religions, Hindu, Buddhist, and Mohammedan, to 
which prohibition the majority of her people are still loyal, notwithstanding the shame¬ 
ful temptations set for them by British greed for profit and revenue, embodied in a 
license system. Prohibkion for Mohammedans is the virtue of Turkey. Iceland and 
Greenland and the Faroe Islands are white on the map. Scandanavia and Australasia 
were both half white, signifying local option, with considerable local prohibition. On 
the American continent Canada and the United States were mostly white, with assur¬ 
ance they would soon be wholly so. Mexico had three white provinces, and Porto 
Rico* had voted prohibition. 

But in that map South America stood out as the only continent wholly black. 
That was not because South America is the most drunken part of the world. It was 
really due in part to the fact that Spain and Spanish countries are less given to drunken¬ 
ness than any other white race. The writer heard Mrs. Gordon Gulick, President for 
thirty years of the National Woman’s Christian Temperance Union of Spain, say to a 
Committee of Congress that in all that time she had “ seen only one prostrate drunkard.” 
And she had been looking for them. Countries which started as colonies of Spain are 
also less given to drink than British and Americans. That is the very reason they have 
given less attention to prohibition. Most people only wake up to suppress an evil 
when it becomes intolerable. 

It is a mistake, however, to assume that drink is only harmful when it makes its 
victim helpless. Modern scientific studies of alcohol proclaim that the most moderate, 
even microscopic drinking lowers efficiency of body and mind, diminishes both strength 
and alertness. (See pp. 81, 82.) 

All belligerents in the world war recognized that drink is a hindrance to both 
military and individual efficiency, and they either cut it down or cut it out. See p. 20ff.) 

In the strenuous contests of commerce that have come with peace all over our 
war-wasted world, no nation can afford to handicap its leaders and workers with 
fuddled brains. (See p. 61.) 

SOUTH AMERICA WILL HAVE TO COMPETE IN WORLDWIDE COM¬ 
MERCE WITH A SOBER NORTH AMERICA. 

O'he man who drinks at night can not think as quickly ” the morning after.” A 
bottle of light wine at breakfast, Aschaffenburg found, (see p, 119) cuts down in¬ 
dustrial efficiency in typesetting, on the average, about nine per cent. President C. W. 
Eliot was converted to the belief that even the most gentlemanly moderation in 


* The interesting story of how the native people of Porto Rico, after the International Reform Bureau 
had secured from Congress a referendum on prohibition, took up the battle in their own behalf and carried 
it to victory, with little outside help, is fully told in a pamphlet that includes their quaint but eflfective 
cartoons. This we shall be glad to send to any one who applies with a postage stamp of any country. 
See also I/atin-America in Index at end of book. 




136 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION 


drinking is “ inexpedient/’ by laboratory experiments showing the effects of drinking 
even a little pure wine or beer (see pp. 81, 82); for example, a man is placed at a table 
with two electric bells numbered 1 and 2. If a blue light is thrown up he is to 
strike as quickly as possible, bell No. 1; if a red light, bell No. 2. He does this several 
times wholly free from wine. Then he is given a glass of wine, and the time test is 
made again, with the result that his time reaction, the time required to think which 
bell goes with the light thrown up, is several seconds slower—enough to wreck a train 
if he was an engineer in his cab watching the signals in his swift run. Such facts led 
railroads in the United States, and many other business firms, long ago, to discriminate 
in employment against even moderate drinkers. And now when peace makes labor 
again abundant, it will again be the rule in the United States that the last man hired 
and the first man fired will be the man who is loaded. 

If it is good business in the United States to abstain and require abstinence, is it 
good business for a sister continent, having opportunity for an equal share in this new 
era in the world’s markets, to allow the promoters of drinking to go on tempting its 
workers to waste their money and clog their brains? 

It should be considered also that British and American insurance tables show 
that the years which alcohol will kill in the average drinker, namely from 51 to 64„ 
are the very years that are most valuable commercially and otherwise to a man and to 
his family and to his country—the years also when men who have lived worthily become 
presidents of colleges, of banks, of corporations,—of their country. 

North America’s Cast-Off Brewers Dumping on South America. 

There is a greater reason why all Latin Americas should at once undertake prohibi¬ 
tion—namely, that the brewers, whose secret efforts to dominate politics in the United 
States by boycotts of business men, by bribing and terrorizing officials, by manipulating 
the negro vote and the white labor vote, have been exposed through Senate investiga¬ 
tions, are planning to move their machinery—their machinations also—to the Orient 
and to the Latin Americas. This means not only greater hygienic and economic injury 
through drink, but nullifying of democracy by a trade that is as selfish, as brutal, as 
cruel, as much given to tearing up laws as “ scraps of paper ” as the Huns, to whom 
many of these brewers are kindred both in flesh and spirit. 

Prohibition makes for health, for business prosperity, for good morals, for clean 
politics. 

Never did the Father of Lies get away with a greater falsehood than that wine and 
other drinks contribute to “the joy of living.” “Nothing is true pleasure that is not 
pleasant to remember.” “ A good time is one that does not go off with the having.” 
Wine gives a dangerous gladness for a night, but headache the morning after, and 
heartache often for life because of the sin and folly to which the muffling of con¬ 
science and judgment and the whipping of passion has led. Often two whole lives 
are blighted by one evening’s blindfolding of two souls with drink. From the days 
of Solomon wine has in the total brought to the man and to the nation “ woe and 
sorrow and babblings and contentions and wounds without cause.” This is a case 
when for both the proverb is true, “ Self-denial is self love living for the future.” 
Prohibition is the way to prosperity and peace and progress for every land. 

Beer and Wine Drunkenness. 

Those who think that the harm of drink never goes so far among wine and beer 
drinkers as drunkenness, and surely not so far as delirium tremens will do well to 
ponder the following facts, quoted in the Pioneer, Toronto, Dec. 27, 1918: 


PROHIBITION FOR LATIN AMERICAS 


137 


Dr. Albert Mahaim, of the University of Liege, reported at the Brussels Anti- 
Alcohol Congress that of the 367 cases of alcoholic insanity admitted into the asylum 
in Zurich between 1879 and 1884, 28 had drunk nothing but wine, beer, cider and beer; 
in all, 77 out of 367, i. e. 20.9 per cent., drank only the so-called “ hygienic ’* drinks. 
The figures were taken from the Archiv. fur Psychiatric, 1897. 

Dr. Mahaim further stated: “In this same work I found also that among 246 
admissions to the inebriate asylum of Ellikon (from 1889 to 1894), 28 alcoholics never 
drank anything but wine; 14 nothing but beer; 6 only cider; 55 beer and wine; 11 wine 
and cider; 14 beer and cider; 4 wine and cider and beer; in all, 132 (out of 246) became 
drunkards on these drinks that are called hygienic. 

“These figures oblige us to reflect; they furnish evidence that fermented drinks are 
also poisonous, and that their general use presents a serious social danger in their 
relations to the general health as well as to insanity.” 

Professor Forel, who was presiding when Dr. Mahaim gave his address, said at 
Its close: “I am very glad to have heard the communication of Dr. Mahaim, and espe¬ 
cially the passage relating to fermented drinks, because we total abstainers are often 
accused of exaggeration. He has cited figures showing the proportion of alcoholics 
admitted to the Swiss asylums who became such through the use of wine, beer or cider. 
The proportion of these patients is considerably larger than the figures show. It is a 
serious error to believe that wine and beer do not alcoholize; we have seen a prison 
keeper, who received from the institution a ration of a quart and a half of wine a day, 
and who drank nothing else, go rapidly into delirium tremens. 

“ The asylum of Ellikon has existed eight years and received 500 alcoholics, of 
which 450, about 90 per cent., were alcoholized by fermented drinks. ... In 
Switzerland we have the vine-growing cantons where they drink wine, and there we see 
typical alcoholism, with delirium tremens. During eight years I have treated about 
1,000 alcoholics. The greater part of them became such by the consumption of wine 
and beer, but particularly wine.” 

But let us again return to the patriotic aspect of the subject: Drink handicaps a 
nation in battle and in international industrial competition. Let us abstain and pro¬ 
hibit for God’s sake, for our own sake, for the sake of the family, for the sake of 
our country and the world. 


I. Abstain for your own sake. (1) Because the science of life insurance shows from half a century’s 
test that the abstainers live about 25 per cent longer even than moderate drinkers. (2) Because the 
record of athletes shows that abstainers are also stronger. (3) Because the abstainer has the best chance 
to get and hold a good job. (4) Because the abstainer has smaller chance of going to the jail or poor 
house. (5) Because the abstainer is less liable to alcoholism and gambling and impurity. 

II. Abstain for the sake of your family and associates. (1) “No man has a moral right to do that 
which if the whole world should follow his example, as some are sure to do, will produce more harm than 
good.” (2) Science is declaring that daily tippling is more likely than occasional drunkenness to produce 
hereditary degeneracy. 

III. Abstain for the sake of your country. (1) The intelligent patriot will fight as his country’s 
worst foe the domination of liquor sellers in politics. 

IV. Abstain for God’s sake. “ABSTAIN FROM EVERY FORM OF EVIE.”—I Thes. 5:22. Surely 
no one will seriously claim that the traffic, which Gladstone said truly had done more harm than war, 
pestilence and famine, is not on the whole “a form of evil.” If so I am bound by the divine imperative 
to abstain from all participation in it. 



138 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION 


(Reprinted from the Australian Christian World, Sydney.) 

Abolish the Bar Room. 

Address by Dr. Wilbur F. Crafts in Australian No-License Campaign. 


It is a novel experience to advocate No 
License, as I shall do tonight, in an audi¬ 
ence where the women can help by their 
votes as well as their prayers. The polit- 
icalical issue in our country is the tariff, 
and so “protection,” in that sense, is the 
chief word in our politics—and it is get- 
ing into yours also. But, surely, as some 
one has said, “The protection of boys 
is as important as the protection of pig 
iron,” and so, “Home Protection,” the 
great watchword that Miss Willard gave 
to the W. C. T. U., should surely be the 
watchword of the voting mothers and 
sisters here—aye, of fathers and broth¬ 
ers also. 

And there can be no doubt that the 
chief foe of your homes is what you call 
“the public house,” which surely does not 
get its name from the great watchword 
that underlies the goverment “pro bono 
publico.” On some one saying to a Chris¬ 
tian man, “I see you are more interested 
in Sabbath observance than in Temper¬ 
ance,” he replied, “That is because the 
Sabbath is in the Commandments,” But 
it will be quickly discovered that the li¬ 
quor traffic is against not one command¬ 
ment, but all, if you will put up over a 
bar Paul’s summary of the Law: 

Love Worketh No Ill to His Neighbor. 

There has been some stir in Sydney, I 
see, about taking down some street signs. 
It would make a far greater excitement 
if in the quiet of some night that sign 
should be put over the door of every 
public house. 

Everybody here, and nearly every¬ 
body else, including many drinking men 
and many liquor sellers also, believe the 
sale of intoxicating beverages to be .a 
great evil. Gladstone, though he some¬ 
times drank wine, said that the liquor 
traffic had done more harm to the world 
than war, pestilence, and famine. Roose¬ 
velt, and Rosebery, though not abstain¬ 
ers, have uttered loud warnings against 
the mighty power for evil that the li¬ 
quor traffic exerts, especially by its po¬ 
litical domination. Here is the thought of 
manv in the words of the editor of the 
leading afternoon paper of the U. S. 
Capital (the “Washington Star”):— 

“There are many men in America, not 
teetotalers nor prohibitionists, who 


would be glad for several reasons to see 
the cause of temperance grow in 
strength and influence at this time. For 
one thing, they resent the power in poli¬ 
tics which the liquor traffic has of late 
years been exhibiting. It contributes, 
as the trusts long did, to the campaign 
funds of both parties, in city, county. 
State and national contests, and then 
asks favours. In many cities it rules the 
roost. 

“It is a widespread belief that there 
would be a wholesome general uplift by 
the introduction into our public affairs 
of a great moral question—by an appeal 
to the people on something higher than 
tariff rates and public improvements and 
all that. Why not touch them on some¬ 
thing besides their pocket-book, and see 
the effect of the change? And what bet¬ 
ter thing for the purpose than the thing 
which everybody concedes is, without 
strict restraint, a terrible evil?” 

In a concert hall in the city of Buffalo, 
Kipling saw two young men get two 
young girls drunk, and then lead them 
reeling down a dark street. Mr. Kip¬ 
ling has not been a total abstainer nor 
had his writings commended prohibi¬ 
tion, but of that scene he writes: “Then 
recanting previous opinions, I became a 
prohibitionist.^ Better it is that a man 
should go without his beer in public 
places, and content himself with swear¬ 
ing at the narrow-mindedness of the ma¬ 
jority; better it is to poison the inside 
with very vile_ temperance drinks, and to 
buy lager furitively at back doors, than 
to bring temptation to the lips of young 
fools such as the four I had seen. I un¬ 
derstand now why the preachers rage 
against drink. I have said: ‘There is no 
harm in it, taken moderately;’ and yet my 
own demand for beer helped directly to 
send these two girls reeling down the 
dark street to—God alone knows what 
end. If liquor is worth drinking, it is 
worth taking a little trouble to come at— 
such as a man will undergo to compass 
his own desires. It is not good that we 
should let it lie before the eyes of chil¬ 
dren, and I have been a fool in writing 
to the contrary.” 

Many who have nothing to say against 
drinking at home, see that the bar great¬ 
ly incerases the drink evil by providing a 
treating, loafing, plotting resort, fre- 


This leaflet presented by International Reform Bureau, 206 Pennsylvania Ave., s. e., Washington, 
D. C. Send for lists of reform literature on intoxicants, impurity, gambling, Sunday rest, Bible in 
Schools, censorship of motion pictures, etc. 




ABOLISH THE BAR ROOM 


139 


quented by all kinds of bad characters 
and open late into the night. I am in¬ 
formed that, although your drinking 
places all pretend to be hotels, many of 
them, in the suburbs especially, have no 
accommodations for lodgers and serve 
no meals, and are nothing more than 
what we call saloons, where no food is 
served except salty free lunches to in¬ 
crease thirsts. 

As the issue is not State prohibition, 
but local option, the articles about the 
State of Maine published in your papers 
as paid advertisements by the liquor deal¬ 
ers, which are as wrong as they are long, 
do not at all apply to the issue pending 
here. Their chief claim is that big cities, 
where a majority do not favor prohibi¬ 
tion, are coerced in vain by the rural 
vote. If that were true, what has it to 
do with no-license campaigns in which 
the big cities are to settle the question 
by their own votes? But Maine may 
be cited in another way to show that no¬ 
license is home protection. I was myself 
brought up there, and never saw a bar, 
nor had my associates any real tempta¬ 
tion to drink. It should not be inferred 
from this that there is no liquor selling 
in Maine. Its prohibitory law is some¬ 
times violated, as your laws against im¬ 
porting opium and against stealing are 
violated. No-license laws come under 
the great definition that was given of all 
laws, as intended to make it harder to do 
wrong and easier to do right. What 
does it mean that your liquor dealers 
and their champions are declaring that 
liquor dealers in America actually violate 
the law and so nullify it? Is this a threat 
that dealers here will also break the law? 
Surely it can have no other meaning, 
and this threat affords a new argument 
why this law-breaking class should be 
put out of town. 

The proper American precedents to 
study in a local option campaign are the 
great and increasing areas in the United 
States that have been put under no¬ 
license by local option. More people of 
the United States are now under no¬ 
license than ever before. The State of 
Georgia is a typical case. Some of the 
smaller towns first voted out the saloons, 
and no-license so decreased the vices and 
taxes, that it spread like a blessed con¬ 
tagion, until the whole State adopted 
prohibition. Because local prohibition, 
in spite of “interstate commerce” difficul¬ 
ties that no other country would have, 
has worked satisfactorily, the people 
want the prohibition by wholesale. 

The Issue not Abstinence but Abolition 
of the Bar Room 

Those of us who believe in total ab¬ 
stinence need to remember that is not 


the issue in a no-Iicense vote, but only 
the abolition of the bar. Many, if not 
most of the men who vote no-license in 
the United States, are men who some¬ 
times drink, but they do not wish to have 
twenty, or forty, or a hundred men in 
town whose epuidity spurs them on 
from morning to night to induce men and 
boys to drink and drink and drink. This 
is the real way to “eliminate cupidity,” 
by banishing from your own town those 
who make a living by inducing young 
men and boys to begin the drink habit, 
and reformed men to renew it. It does 
not eliminate cupidity, we found in South 
Carolina, for the Government to sell the 
drink and give the profits to office hold¬ 
ers and taxpayers, whose cupidity is even 
more dangerous, because more wide¬ 
spread, than that of liquor dealers. No 
license does not prevent a man from im¬ 
porting liquors for use in his own home. 
What every no-license law attempts is 
to put out of the town or State those 
whose business is to induce others, by 
show windows and music and social fel¬ 
lowship, to drink, when they would not 
otherwise do so. No license banishes 
the drink promoter. 

The Danger of Compromising on 
Reduction. 

If you vote for “reduction” you vote 
against “No-license,” but when you vote 
“No-license,” if that larger good fails, 
your vote will be counted for reduction. 

The United States has been for a hun¬ 
dred years an experiment station of 
liquor laws, and one thing we have 
learned is that reducing the number of 
bars does not materially reduce the con¬ 
sumption or consequences of drink, ex¬ 
cept when, in rare instances, it removes 
the drinking places altogether from a 
considerable area. For example, when 
in a city block containing three bars, 
there is a “one-third reduction,” or even 
a “two-thirds reduction,” in the number 
of drinking places, while the remaining 
one is made more attractive and palatial 
by getting a monopoly of that block, it 
no more reduces the business than elim¬ 
inating superfluous oil refineries to con¬ 
centrate the business in a Standard Oil 
Company reduces that business. Even 
good men sometimes speak as if “elim¬ 
inating the worst resorts” was a great 
advantage, when in fact it is only the 
more respectable places that start boys 
and young men in the drink habit. In 
this respect the “best places,” are the 
worst. “Reduction,” voted again and 
attain in three-year periods, might at last 
come to something, but whoever wishes 
to really protect the home now should 
VOTE “NO-LICENSE.” 


140 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION 


Alcohol the Excretion of a Microbe 


President Hadley of Yale University said, long since, that if people knew the real 
nature of alcohol they would drive every saloon from the land. That is one way to 
drive the saloon from other lands. What is alcohol? Professor Hodge of Clark 
University describes it as “ the waste product of a microbe,” Dr. Jas. Empringham, 
Secretary of the Episcopal Board of Temperance in January issue of its organ 
“Progress,” expands this statement in the following statement; 

“ Billions of mycodermata gather on the skins of grapes. When the grapes are 
crushed, these microscopic organisms fall into the juice, devour the sugar and excrete 
a narcotic toxic poison which the chemist calls ethyl hydrate—but the popular name 
for it is ' alcohol.’ When this refuse from the mycodermata is permitted to remain in 
the grape juice, we call the mixture ‘wine’; when, by distillation, this liquid excreta 
has been separated from the wine, we name it ‘ brandy.’ 

We turn the starch of barley into a sugary solution, introduce some of the micro¬ 
scopic organisms, and when they have all committed suicide in their own toxic excre¬ 
tion, we label the result ‘beer.’ We extract this filthy excretion, this habit-forming 
drug, from the beer and then call it ‘ whiskey.” 


“ There is a popular delusion that alcohol (the excreta of the mycodermata we 
have been describing) is a beverage. We talk of the curse of ‘drink’; but alcohol is 
no more a drink than is morphine or cocaine. We imagine alcohol to be a beverage 
because whenever we see this drug, it is always mixed with a large quantity of water. 
Beer is generally ninety-five per cent water, wine about eighty-nine per cent water and 
whiskey fifty per cent water. 



“ If a chemist removed every drop of water from a barrel of beer and a man 
drank a glass of this waterless beer, he would die the same hour. Alcohol is the exact 


opposite of drink; its affinity for water is 
causing fearful thirst, resulting in death. 

“I know unfortunate men who are the 


so great it robs the tissues of moisture, 

slaves of morphine, but they always seem 
ashamed of their weakness. I never 
knew a morphine fiend greet a friend 
on the street with ‘ Come over to the 
drug store and have a morphine on 
me.’ Those addicted to chloral 
hydrate are equally ashamed of their 
habit. Why should ethyl hydrate 
(alcohol) be considered more re¬ 
spectable than choral hydrate? They 
are both narcotic, habit-forming 
drugs.” 


Central Control Board of Great Britain, a 
majority of whose members were friendly to 
the liquor traffic, which they were appointed 
to regulate, not prohibit, said in report Nov., 
191G, all of which is worth studying as con¬ 
taining the admissions of non-prohibitionists: 
“Alcohol is narcotic, rather than stimulant in 
action. Its nutritional value is strictly limited. 
Its habitual use as an aid to work is physio¬ 
logically unsound.” 



GUIDING PRINCIPLES FOR CHRISTIAN VOTERS 


141 


Guiding Principles for Christian Voters 


“ After reconstruction, the next great question will be the overthrow of the 
liquor traffic.”—Abraham Lincoln to Mr. J. B. Merwin, April 14, 1865, the 
morning before his assassination. 



Washington: Let us raise a standard 
to which the wise and honest can repair. 
The event is in the hand of God. 

Lincoln: I am not bound to win, but 
I am bound to be true. I am not bound 
to succeed, but I am bound to live up to 
the light I have. Stand with anybody 
that stands right. Stand with him while 
he is right, and part with him when he 
goes wrong.” 

Roosevelt: “If a candidate be corrupt, 
then refuse, under any plea of party ex¬ 
pediency, under any consideration to re¬ 
frain from smiting him with the sword of 
the Lord and of Gideon.” (See p. 105.) 

Charles Sumner: “Where principle is, 
there is my party.” 


Note that this leaflet speaks for North and ^uth 
prepaid by the International Reform Bureau, 206 re, 


Jefferson: “The excise law is an in¬ 
fernal one. The first error was to admit 
it by the Constitution, the second was to, 
act on that admission.” 

William McKinley, July 10, 1874: 

“Every man who votes for license be¬ 
comes of necessity a partner to the liquor 
traffic and all its consequences.” 

Horace Greeley, in Tribune: “Now, it 
is mad, it is driveling, to talk of regulat¬ 
ing the traffic in intoxicating beverages 
Raise the charge for license to $10,000. 
and enact that nobody but a doctor of 
divinity shall be allowed to sell, and you 
will have no material improvement on 
the state of things now presented, because 
so long as one man is licensed to sell, 
thousands will sell without license. The 
law is robbed of all moral sanction and 
force by the fact that it grants dispensa¬ 
tions to some who do with impunity and 
for their own profit that which is for¬ 
bidden to others.” 

Hon. J .W. Longley, Attorney General 
of Nova Scotia: “It would be the greatest 
blessing in life that could be conferred 
upon our institutions if in every one of 
the Two Hundred and Fifteen constitu¬ 
ents of Canada there were a hundred men 
who did not care a button about party, 
and voted as they thought was right and 
proper in the interests of the country.” 
Some of those in public life would get 
hurt, and it would not always work right 
for the machine, but it would influence 
those high in the councils of the nation 
to pursue a course that would command 
the respect of the best and truest ele¬ 
ments in the country.” 


and Canada—for the world. For sale at 50c. per lOQ. 
in’a Av., s. e.. Washington, D. C. 







142 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION 


INDICTMENT OF THE LIQUOR TRAFFIC 

(Unanimous declaration of Missisippi Temperance Convention, 1904, Bishop C. D. Galloway, Pres.) 

The beverage liquor traffic is an unmitigated moral, social, financial and po¬ 
litical evil. 

It is at war with all the forces that tend to build up men into better lives. 

It breeds every social disorder and wars persistently upon the home and all 
organized society. 

It wastes the living of dependent women and children, and destroys the 
productive energy of the people. 

It seeks to control for corrupt purposes political parties. 

It enslaves many public men, subverts public justice, debauches the public 
conscience, schools its patrons to perjury, and is the implacable enemy of both 
church and state. 

We declare that every effort to regulate the traffic by license laws has_ been 
a failure; that while the law forbids any one to engage in the traffic who is not 
of good moral character, there is that inherent in the traffic which inevitably 
subverts moral character, and as a result the business drifts into the hands of 
men who are morally depraved. 

And so far-reaching is its influence that in some instances the law against 
the traffic has failed, for the reason that the corrupting influence of the dram 
shoo at times reaches the inner precincts of justice and subverts all law. 

We, therefore, condemn the license system of the beverage liquor traffic, 
in any form, as a delusion and a snare, and declare that the only consistent, 
wise and righteous policy of the state is to withdraw from all partnership in 
or complicity with it; to put it under the ban of law, to turn against it the whole 
power of the state, moral and legal, as a common enemy, not only bad in itself, 
but the ever-willing ally of all other evil forces which afflict society. No people 
have the moral right to license sin to raise the public revenue. 


HENRY GRADY ON DRINK. 

To-day it strikes a crust from the lips of a starving child, and to-morrow levies 
tribute from the government itself. 

There is no cottage humble enough to escape it, no place strong enough to shut it 

out. 

It defies the law when it cannot coerce suffrage. 

It is flexible to cajole, but merciless in victory. 

It is the mortal enemy of peace and order, the despoiler of men and terror of 
women, the cloud that shadows the face of children, the demon that has dug more 
graves and sent more souls unshrived to judgment than all the pestilences that have 
wasted life since God sent the plagues to Egypt, and all the wars since Joshua stood 
beyond Jericho. 

It comes to ruin, and it shall profit mainly by the ruin of your sons and mine. 

It comes to mislead human souls and to crush human hearts under its rumbling 
wheels. 

It comes to bring gray-haired mothers down in shame and sorrow to their graves. 

It comes to change the wife’s love into despair and her pride into shame. 

It comes to still the laughter on the lips of little children. 

It comes to stifle all the music of the home and fill it with silence and desolation. 

It comes to ruin your body and mind, to wreck your home, and it knows it must 
measure its prosperity by the swiftness and certainty with which it wrecks this world. 


Is the liquor traffic guilty, as charged? Then let the verdict be. Abstinence 
.and Prohibition. 




GUIDING PRINCIPLES FOR CHRISTIAN VOTERS 


143 


BAR KEEPERS 

“ COME OUT FROM AMONG THEM/’ - 

“ The curse of God Almighty is on your business. You know it. 

Your coffers drip with human blood. 

You know it. 

“ You are barred out from all decent society. 

“ You know it. 

'' The Masonic fraternity have kicked you out. The Knights of Pythias 
have kicked you out- The Odd Fellows have kicked you out. Catholic 
Benevolent Societies have kicked you out. The great insurance companies have 
kicked you out. 

“ The railroads of America, won’t employ your patrons. 

“ The churches reject men for membership who rent your property. 

Only a few places like the penitentiary, the poor house, and the potter’s 
field are open to your graduates. 

Of all men you are regarded as the scum of the earth in this world, and 
you face a fearful destiny in the next. 

Are you blind to these facts ? 

“ Are you dumb to all appeals ? 

“We implore you, for your own sake, for your family’s sake, for humanity’s 
sake, quite the saloon business.”— Clinton N. Howard. 

CHRISTIANS 

“ COME OUT FROM AMONG THEM.” 

The saloon is damning each year its scores of thousands of souls, and 
wrecking its thousands of homes. No church should allow any one who is in 
it to hold office. No Christian should rent property for any purpose connected 
with the curse, as saloon, office, or hotel where liquor is sold.— Robert E. Speer. 

VOTERS 

“ COME OUT FROM AMONG THEM.” 

Dr. Howard S. Taylor, Chicago City Prosecutor: The saloon-keeper is 
as good as his license; the license as good as the official who signed it; the 
signer as good as the legislature which made it possible; the legislature as good 
as those who elected them- 


International Sunday School Association 

That I may give my best service to God and to my Fellowmen 

S PrnmtHP (Hob anb piebge iMgaelf 

never to use Intoxicating Liquors as a drink and to do all I can to 
end the Drink Habit and the Liquor Traffic. 




144 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION 



J. W. Bengough. 


“ Blind tigers ” are bad, but I would be much more fearful for the safety of my 
children on the street if there was one tiger with his eyes open.— O. R. Miller. 

IS STATE CONTROL OF DRINK A DELIVERANCE OF A DELUSION? 

Should the State conduct the beverage sale of intoxicants? Some good people say 
so. What is the essence of their logic? The major premise is: The growth of the 
liquor traffic, with its attendent evils, is due more to the greed of the seller than to the 
appetite of the buyer. The minor premise is: If the liquor were sold by government 
employees, whose salaries would not be increased by increased sales, the profits being 
devoted to schools and charities—since cheapening the liquors would be considered 
dangerous—the element of cupidity would be eliminated. The conclusion is, Elimin¬ 
ating cupidity from the liquor traffic thus would eliminate most of its harm. 

The trouble is with the minor premise. The dispensary does not even in theory, 
much less in practice, dispense with cupidity but only extends it to a larger number 
of people, retaining personal cupidity and adding social cupidity. The tax-payer does 
not see that the liquor traffic, which he is thus bribed by the State bar to spare when 
it should be slain, increases his taxes for pauperism and crime.— W. F. CRAFTS. 

On Brewers Plot to Nullify National Prohibition Amendment by Inciting Workingmen 

to “ No Beer, no Work ” Strikes. 

Germany tried to terrorize the world, and after her armies are. whipped to a 
standstill on the other side of the Atlantic we do not intend to lose the war to the 
German brewers in America. It is the German brewers, backers of the German-American 
Alliance, which defended the murder of American citizens on the high seas, the ravish¬ 
ing of Belgium, the enslavement of French women, the outraging and crucifixion of 
Armenian girls, the bayoneting of babies, that having failed to buy Legislatures in this 
country to defeat ratification are now inciting to riot and rebellion, willing to jeopardize 
the American nation in order to save beer. Let them beware. There may be room 
for honest difference of opinion as to the terms of an enforcement measure, but when 
the issue of nullification is raised we fight. And we will continue to fight until the in¬ 
famous liquor traffic is thrown back into the hell which spawned it, and until, if neces¬ 
sary, its German brewer patron saints are sent back to Germany, which is as close as we 
can send them to their proper place without committing manslauehter.—Wm. H. 
Anderson, Feb- 25, 1919. -— 

We appeal from Philip drunk to Philip sober from Germany brutalized by beer 
and infidelity and militarism to the old Germany of Luther, and the new Germanv for 
which we pray—such as our loyal citizens of German stock prove may emerge from the 
revolution if the German people repent of their attempt to enslave the world as 
America repented of the slavery that was abolished forever by our Civil War_W F C 



















THE RESULTS OF PROHIBITION IN CANADA 


145 


The Results of Prohibition in Canada 

[From “Social Welfare,” Toronto, Nov., 1918.] 

Prince Edward Island. 

Mr. T. C. James says: “So many years have passed since prohibition came into 
force that it is impossible to give a clear-cut view of the benefits accruing therefrom, as 
contrasted with the days of license laws which preceded, and which are now only a 
memory to the older generation. An expression of opinion was given many years ago 
by the Stipendiary Magistrate of Charlottetown, endorsed by the City Assessor, and 
leading men in the coal, dry goods and grocery trades, and there was unanimity that 
prohibition had resulted in a marked decrease in the number of arrests (as shown by 
the records of the police court); that the condition and general appearance of the homes 
in the city has greatly improved; that trade was better, and that the more prompt pay¬ 
ment of bills was a marked feature of the new condition. All this in spite of the fact 
that the law then was very imperfectly enforced. Today, owing partly to the ap¬ 
pointment of the Temperance Commission and partly to the more stringent regulations, 
there is a marked change for the better in this respect, and there is no doubt that the 
benefits noted in the early days of prohibition have gone on in an increasing scale. So 
thoroughly is prohibition appreciated throughout the whole province, that it is safe 
to say that there is no district in which an advocate of the repeal of the law would 
stand any chance of election. 


Nova Scotia. 

Equally enthusiastic is the testimony of Nova Scotia. The Premier of the 
Province has expressed himself as gratified with improved conditions in the province 
resulting from Provincial Prohibition. Other members of the government have 
endorsed this opinion. The mayors of towns and chiefs of police have borne similar 
testimony. Members of the House of Assembly, who a little over two years ago 
(prohibition became effective in Halifax, 30th June, 1916) opposed the enactment of 
prohibition for the city are today numbered in the ranks of prohibitionists, and 
seventy-five per cent of the citizens who formerly were opposed to the enactment of 
the law, are now its advocates. 

The economic benefit is very marked. Managers of large business firms have 
stated that comparing sales for a certain period of time under license and prohibition, 
the gain was from twenty to thirty per cent. 

Enforced prohibition has made a decrease in crime, drunkenness and poverty. It 
has transformed hundred of homes, where, instead of wretchedness, there is now 
peace and plenty. 

When municipal enforcement of law, which is the system in this province, gives 
place to effective provincial enforcement, conditions will be yet more improved. The 
prohibition of importation under the War Measures Act. has been of inestimable benefit 
to Nova Scotia. 


A much more detailed survey of the liquor status of the various countries is given by Dr. and Mrs. 
W F Crafts in March, 1919, issue of 20th Century Quarterly as a “ Prohibition Inspection Tour of the 
World ” The imaginary party starts in Canada, goes through the United States, West Indes, Central 
America down east coast of South America, up West Coast through Panama Canal, on to Greenland, 
Iceland ’ Britain, Portugal, Spain, France, North to Scandanavia, on through Germany, Switzerland, 
Italy North through new republics cut off of Austria-Hungary and Russia, through to China, Japan, 
Philippines, India, Austria, Afgnanistan, Persia, Turkey, Balkans, Greece, Palestine, Fgypt east, south, 
west and North Africa. This Quarterly will be sent on application, with stamp, of any country. 




146 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION 


New Brunswick. 

There can be no question but that prohibition has completely revolutionized the 
social life of New Brunswick. This is the unreserved testimony of the chief inspector 
for the province. Especially are the benefits evidentin the lumber trade, where the men 
arrive in the bush, sober, well-behaved and ready to work the first morning. 
Drinking in the trains and public places has also been eliminated. The payment of 
debts is most gratifying, the records of one collector showing an increase of 66 per cent. 
Here, too the family life has been raised to a much higher standard. 

Quebec. 

From Quebec no adequate summary can be obtained, for though many counties and 
towns have local option, the city of Montreal does not come under prohibition until 
May, 1919. In consideration of these circumstances, any report would not be a fair 
statement of the case, since we may suspect that “all roads lead to Montreal." 

Ontario. 

In the Province of Ontario, in spite of frequent undesirable importations from the 
ancient province to the east, and the presence of “home brew" in large quantities in 
certain sections, still, the good effect of the Order-in-Council respecting the manufac¬ 
ture and importation of liquor is evident from the statement of Col. Grassett, Chief Con¬ 
stable of the city of Toronto. During the eight months of this year there have been 
2143 arrests for drunkenness as against 2946 for the same period of the preceding year, 
a decrease of 803, or 27.2%. During the first three months, however, before the present 
Order-in-Council came into effect the decrease was 49, the figures being 1013 and 1062 
respectively, or 4.6%, while during the last five months the decrease has been 754, the 
figures being 1130 and 1884, or 40%. 

Keeping in mind that large quantities of liquor previously imported have been 
available during these months and that during the whole month of April liquor was 
being delivered, this showing seems somewhat encouraging. 

Manitoba. 

A fair index to the working out results of the legislation in Manitoba may be found 
in the following statement by F. J. Billiarde, Juvenile Court of Winnipeg; “ The chief 
factor to which may be attributed the falling off in delinquency is the closing of the 
saloons and bar-rooms." 


Saskatchewan. 

Saskatchewan is most definite in its support of the measure. We are indebted to 
our Provisional Secretary, W. J. Stewart, for the information herewith printed. While 
there are no statistics to show just what money has been saved in Saskatchewan under 
temperance legislation, yet authentic statements estimate the amount at not less than 
$10,000,000 per annum. 

The social life of the province has a higher and claner tone. Business transac¬ 
tions and social relationships are not now linked up with the social glass. 

The family is where the greatest good has been accomplished. That fathers and 
sons are not tempted by the open bar and their earnings squandered as formerly, is 
wonderfully evidenced by the material, social and moral blessings that have come in 
the new order upon thousands of our homes. The children are able to go to school 
and to college, and to acquire an education impossible where the home was impover¬ 
ished and cursed by strong drink. 


THE RESULTS OF PROHIBITION IN CANADA 


147 


The organized liquor traffic no longer exists, and so has no power in the realm of 
politics. The dying kicks of the traffic in Saskatchewan were aimed at the government 
for its advanced temperance legislation. While liquor can be procured by prescription 
there is little drunkenness to be seen. 

Practically all crime resulting from intoxication has vanished. This does not say 
that we have no crime, but crime from drunkenness has ceased. That for nearly four 
years several thousand soldiers have been in Regina, and, according to police report, 
not a single case of trouble, argues well for prohibition. 

The general sentiment of the province is overwhelmingly in favor of prohibition. 
There are no indications of reverting to the open bar, or to any other method of dis¬ 
posing of alcoholic liquors, other than by prescription for medicinal, mechanical and 
scientific purposes. 


Alberta. 

There is but one voice in the Province of Alberta regarding the effect of prohibi¬ 
tion, viz., that it has been most beneficent. It is nothing short of a social revolution 
affecting every phase of human life. During the first two years of prohibition, there 
was created a new market for legitimate business throughout the province to the extent 
of $15,000,000. 


British Columbia, 

From one of the best known newspaper men on the Pacific Coast comes the report 
of British Columbia’s satisfaction with the law. 

Prohibition has been most satisfactory. Two things have qualified its complete 
success, one was the large stock of liquor which was cached by private individuals 
previous to the advent of the law in preparation for a protracted drought. This has, of 
course, been drawn on freely and, under the law, there can be little interference with it. 
However, its exhaustion is rapidly approaching and the difficulties from that source 
would seem to be nearing an end. 

There is a degree of blindpigging but ont more than under the license law. In 
Vancouver, where the shipbuilding trade involves a daily payroll of $20,000 to $25,000, 
with the individual drawing from $5 to $10 a day (where previously he earned a bare 
living wage), there is practical immunity from drunkenness, and free movement of 
money. “With no dry law in effect we would have had a veritable hell in this town.” 
Thousands of homes have been improved and opinion is practically unanimous in favor 
of the law. 

One of the most valuable comments is that of the editor of a British Columbia 
labor paper, a former bitter opponent of the law, who says that prohibition has enabled 
him to consolidate labor interests, as he could never do previously. The men come to 
the meetings sober, regularly and with money; business can be transacted sanely and 
readily. The employers speak enthusiastically of the law, since labor is stabilized. 

Such whole-hearted endorsation of the legislation seems to guarantee the perma¬ 
nence of the measure in the various provinces, The liquor interests will perforce con¬ 
centrate on preventing the Federal War Time Prohibition Act from becoming perma¬ 
nent by Act of Parliament, as their one hope of plying again their ancient and (per¬ 
sonally) profitable trade, or failing this, upo getting exemption in Federal or Provin¬ 
cial legislation for wine and beer. While this and other schemes must be watched and 
fought, there is no likelihood of their success. Public opinion is too solidly in favor of 
a permanently and completely dry Canada. 


148 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION 


Books Suitable For Worldwide Prohibition 

Campaign. 

The first edition of this book represented the status of prohibition in the United 
States, and, to some extent, in other lands, in September, 1918, just before war prohibi¬ 
tion was finally decreed, and when ratification of national constitutional prohibition 
had not yet been assured by the November elections. This second edition differs from 
the first in the addition of sixty-four pages of new matter (pp. 129-192), concluding with 
an alphabetical index. 

The chapters on ratification and war prohibition may seem to some Arnerican 
readers at first glance to be out of date—also those on local and State prohibition. 
But there is still need to prepare those who voted against prohibition to accept it cor¬ 
dially by showing our reasons. And this book was written for worldwide use. In 
every chapter there are facts and arguments that will be used in battles for local 
prohibition in Scotland and elsewhere; for Dominion prohibition in Canada and New 
Zealand; for national prohibition in Sweden and other lands; all of which facts and 
arguments are made accessible by the new analytical index at the close. 

“ The Maine Law,” by Ernest Gordon, the first answer in a real book of literary 
quality to the misrepresentations of Maine prohibition sent all over the world in count¬ 
less press articles and leaflets and in the books of Sherwell and Rountree and John 
Koren—the latter now exposed as a secretly subsidized agent of the brewers, though 
posing successfully as an independent literateur to such an extent that he has been 
elected to many honorary positions in statistical and other literary and philanthropic 
societies. They owe it to the public to withdraw those honors, given under misappre¬ 
hension. 

Another book, “ Two Footnotes to the History of the Anti-Alcohol Movement,” 
also by Mr. Gordon, naturally goes with “ The Maine Law,” because it shows the hostile 
animus both of Mr. Koren and ” The Committee of Fifty,” of whom he was the chief 
agent, in their veiled attacks on prohibition and total abstinence, and especially on scien¬ 
tific temperance teaching in the schools. 

Another book of Mr. Gordon’s, ” The Breakdown of the Gothenburg System,” is 
very timely wherever there is effort to put in that ” buffer State ” in place of prohibition. 
It is the sort of scholarly, judicial weighing of the evidence that will carry any man open 
to conviction. 

Mr. Gordon’s ” Russia,” though revolutionary chaos has eclipsed prohibition for 
the time, would be of great value in China and other lands as showing the great political, 
economic, social and moral benefits that accrued in the first year of the first national 
prohibition. 

Mr. Gordon’s greatest book, “ The Anti-Alcohol Movement in Europe,” should be 
circulated widely in the United States to kill forever the appeal for toleration of wine 
a^nd beer, and it is particularly adapted for circulation among the scholarly natives of 
China, Japan, and India to save Asia from Europe’s tragic experience with alcohol. 

We are presenting to foreign Sunday schools, through the World’s Sunday School 
Associatom, besides Mrs. Stella B. Irvine’s lesson leaflets and Miss Stoddard’s 
booklet, ”• Shall We Spare Wine and Beer?” and her illustrated ” Handbook of Modern 
Facts About Alcohol”—all these for translation into many languages—Crafts “World 
Book of Temperance,” an illustrated cyclopedia, in readable form, written for world 
use, with Bible lessons in the foreground ,but temperance teachings of science and his¬ 
tory also used as parallel passages. (Other books suitable for this campaign noted on 
p. 183.) 

Most important of all new literature we regard the stenographic report of the U S 
Senate investigations of the secret political plotting of the breweres a digest of which 
every one interested should ask Hon. C. H. P. Randall, Washington, D. C., to send him. 

This investigaHon should make the patriotic argument for prohibition supreme in 
all democracies. By so much as treason to a nation is worse than the robbing or 
murder of an individual, by so much is the injury of drink to business and to the body 
overtopped by its poisoning of the body politic. Only by deposing the liquor power in 
politics can we make the world, or any part of it, “safe for democracy ” 


STATISTICS OF RATIFICATION OF NATIONAL PROHIBITION 149 

Status of Prohibition in U. S. by States, Mar. 4,1919 

Based on Clip Sheet of Mr. Deets Pickett, Research Secretary of Methodist 
Board of Temperance, Prohibition, and Public Morals, for December 28, 1919, with 
additional notes for gains to March 4, 1919, by International Reform Bureau. 

ALABAMA. Under Statewide statutory prohibition, enacted Jan, 14, 1915, effect¬ 
ive July 1, 1915. Vote in Legislature about 3 to 1 dry. Advanced law enforcement 
features expected of Legislature meeting in 1919. Ratified, 1919, Senate 23 to 11, 
House 64 to 34. 

ARIZONA. Under Statewide statutory prohibition, Nov. 3, 1914, 25,887 to 22,743, 
effective Jan. 1, 1915. Law overthrown by State Supreme Court, Nov. 7, 1916. 
Voters amended Constitution, prohibition getting majority twice that previously 
given. Ratified, 1918, Senate, 17 to 0, House 29 to 3, 

ARKANSAS. Under Statewide statutory prohibition, Jan. 5, 1915, effective Jan. 1, 
1916. Senate vote was 33 to 2, House unanimous. Under initiative, liquor interests 
forced vote on repeal Nov. 7, 1916, but were defeated by 50,600 majority. Law is very 
drastic. Even physician can not prescribe liquor, though he may administer it under 
his personal direction. Ratified 1919, Senate 34 to 0, House 92 to 2, 

CALIFORNIA. Seven entirely dry counties. Only county and city of San 
Francisco entirely wet. About 66 per cent, of territory and 50 per cent, of population 
under dry law. Nov. 5, 1918, California voted on prohibition, giving 275,643 yeas 
to 306,488 nays. State voted on another wet and dry proposal same election, which 
divided dry vote. During 1918 Los Angeles closed all saloons and restricted sale of 
liquors with meals to hours between 11 A. M. and 9 P. M. San Jose and Stockton did 
likewise. Several small cities went dry. No dry territory changed to wet. Governor 
running on ratification platform was elected by 136,358 majority. Ratified, 1919, Senate 
25 to 14, House, 48 to 28. 

COLORADO. Under Statewide constitutional prohibition, Nov. 3, 1914, 129,589 
to 118,017, law becoming effective Jan. 1, 1916. Liquor interests proposal to amend 
law to except beer from prohibition, defeated Nov. 7, 1916, by 77,345 votes for to 
163,134 against. Denver gave majority against beer amendment, vote being 23,112 to 
3)4,195. Nov. 5, 1918, importation of liquors for personal use prohibited by majority 
of about 50,000, Denver giving dry majority of 6,800. Ratified, 1919, Senate, 29 to 1; 
House, 63 to 2. 

CONNECTICUT. 101 dry towns and 67 wet; dry gain of one during 1918. About 
65 per cent, territory and 30 per cent population dry. In 1917, Assembly submitted 
Statewide prohibition. Must be submitted and passed again by two-thirds in 1919, 
after which will go to the people. Vote adversely. Six more years to ratify. 

DELAWARE. Two dry counties, one wet. In 1918 rural portion of New Castle 
county went dry; 98 per cent, of territory and 50 per cent, of population dry. Only 
Wilmington wet. Ratified, 1918, Senate, 13 to 3; House, 27 to 6. 

FLORIDA. Under Statewide constitutional prohibition, Nov. 5, 1918, effective 
Jan. 1, 1919. At 1918 election every county in State unofficially reported to have favored 
prohibition. Ratified, 1918; Senate, 25 to 2; House, 61 to 3. 

GEORGIA. Under Statewide statutory prohibition, Aug. 6, 1907, effective Jan. 1, 
1908. Senate, 34 to 7; House, 139 to 39. Bone dry law approved March 28, 1917; 
Senate, 34 to 1; House, 115 to 30. Ratified, 1918; Senate, 34 to 2; House, 129 to 24. 



150 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION 


IDAHO. Under statutory Statewide prohibition, Feb., 1915, effective Jan. 1, 1916. 
This is strictest possible law, forbidding possession of brandy, whiskey and beer under 
any circumstances, and allowing wine and pure alcohol to be possessed only for 
sacramental and medicinal purposes. Law upheld by United States Supreme Court. 
Nov. 7, 1916, people of Idaho voted by about two to one for constitutional amendment, 
effective May 1, 1917, fortifying the prohibition law. Ratified, 1919, Senate, 38 to 0; 
House, 62 to 0. 

ILLINOIS. 54 dry counties, 48 wet. 87 per cent, of area and 48 per cent, of 
population dry. In 1918 Bloomington, Rock Island, Fulton, Pana, Mt. Pulaski, Lin¬ 
coln, Savanna, East Moline, St. Charles and Chester voted dry. Only one township 
with two villages went back to wet. Ratified, 1919, Senate, 30 to 15; House, 84 to 66. 

INDIANA. Under Statewide statutory prohibition, effective Apr. 2, 1918, House, 
70 to 28; Senate, 38 to 11. State Supreme Court held law constitutional June 28, 1918. 
Ratified, 1919; Senate, 41 to 6; House, 87 to 11. 

IOWA. Under Statewide statutory prohibition, Feb., 1915, effective Jan. 1, 1916. 
By small majority, in 1917, declined to adopt constitutional prohibition. Ratified, 
1919, Senate, 42 to 7; House, 86 to 13. 

KANSAS. Under Statewide constitutional prohibition, 1880, by majorit,y of 
7,837. Feb., 1917, House prohibited importation of liquors even for personal use. 
House, 103 to 12; Senate, 37 to 1. For past 15 years all parties have stood for prohibi¬ 
tion. Independent wet candidate beaten in 1914 by 10 to 1. Ratified, 1919, Senate, 
39 to 0; House, 121 to 0. 

KENTUCKY. 108 dry counties, 12 wet; 96 per cent, of territory and 81 per cent, 
of population dry. 1918 Legislature passed anti-shipping law and submitted State¬ 
wide prohibition—Senate, 28 to 6; House, 76 to 11. Election vote on State amendment 
by people, Nov. 4, 1919. Ratified, 1918—Senate, 30 to 8; House, 84 to 13. 

LOUISIANA. 34 of 61 parishes are dry, including 53 per cent, of population and 
21 pei* cent, of territory. Ratified, 1918; Senate, 21 to 20; House, 69 to 51. 

MAINE. Under Statewide prohibition adopted 1851, made constitutional 1884, 
70,630 to 23,658. Law has had poor enforcement at various times, but is in 1919 well 
enforced. Ratified, 1919—Senate, 31 to 1; House, 120 to 22. 

MARYLAND. 20 dry counties; 3 counties and Baltimore city wet. Drys gained 
two counties during year 1918; 55 per cent, of population and 90 per cent, of territory 
dry. Ratified, 1918—Senate, 18 to 7; House, 58 to 36. 

MASSACHUSETTS. Three counties entirely dry; 70 per cent, of territory and 
32 per cent, of population dry. Ratified, 1918; Senate, 27 to 12; House, 145 to 91. 

MICHIGAN. Under Statewide constitutional prohibition Nov. 6, 1916, 353,378 
to 284,754, effective May 1, 1918. Enforcement of the law is under Food and Drug 
Commissioner and State Constabulary. Ratified, 1919; Senate, 26 to 0; House, 
88 to 3. 

MINNESOTA. Sixty-four dry counties, 22 wet, a gain of 5 dry counties since 
1917. Eighty-five per cent, of territory and 47 per cent, of population dry. At election 
Nov. 5, 1918, drys polled 189,547 votes for State-wide prohibition to 173,615 against, a 
dry majority of 15,932, to which Minneapolis contributed a dry majority of 6,913. To 
carry, prohibition required a majority of all votes cast at the election, which it failed 
to get by 756. Ratified, 1919; Senate, 48 to 11; House, 96 to 32. 

MISSISSIPPI. Under Statewide statutory prohibition enacted Feb. 1, 1908, effect¬ 
ive Dec. 1, 1908. Ratified, 1918; Senate, 31 to 6; House, 65 to 10. 


151 


STATISTICS OF RATIFICATION OF NATIONAL PROHIBITION 


MISSOURI. ... 

and 53 per cent, of population are dry. 

Nov. 5, 1918. Ratified, 1919; Senate, 22 to 10 


About 85 of the counties are dry and 29 wet; 90 per cent, of area 
Statewide prohibition was defeated at polls 
'' House, 104 to 36. 


MONTANA. Under Statewide constitutional prohibition, Nov. 7, 1916, 102 776 to 
73,890, effective Jan. 1, 1919. Legislature meeting in 1919 expected to provide State 
sheriff for enforcement of bone dry prohibition. Ratified, 1918; Senate, 34 to 2; House 
67 to 8. * * 


NEBRASKA. Under Statewide constitutional prohibition Nov 7 1916 146 574 
to 117,132. Ratified, 1919; Senate, 21 to 1; House, 98 to 0. ’ ’ ’ 

NEVADA. Under Statewide statutory prohibition, Nov. 5, 1918. Ratified Senate 
14 to 1; House, 32 to 3. ’ ’ 


NEW HAMPSHIRE. Under Statewide statutory prohibition, effective May 1 
1918. House, 190 to 185; Senate, 14 to 9. Ratified, 1919; Senate, 19 to 4- House 221 
to 121. 


NEW JERSEY. Eighty-six local option elections won by drys 1918, 93 by wets* 
net result large dry gain. 30 per cent, of territory, 10 per cent, of population dry! 
During 1918 stronger enforcement laws passed. Six more years in which to ratify. 

NEW MEXICO. Under Statewide statutory prohibition, effective Oct. 1, 1918, 
28,735 to 12,147. Made constitutional in Nov. same year. Ratified, 1919; Senate, 12 
to 4; House, 45 to 1. 


NEW YORK. Six entirely dry counties, gain of one during year 1918. 601 towns 
out of 932 dry, a dry gain during year of 52. Dry counties are Chemung, Delaware, 
Orleans, Schoharie, Tioga, Thompkins and Yates. 6,000 saloons quit business during 
1918, according to report of the state excise commissioner. This is as great a “ score ” 
for the “dry” cause as the banishment of the traffic from a whole state in less 
populous sections. Ratified, 1919; Senate, 27 to 24; House, 81 to 66. 

NORTH CAROLINA. Under Statewide statutory prohibition, 1909. 113 to 612. 

Ratified, 1919; Senate, 49 to 0; House, 93 to 10. 


NORTH DAKOTA. Under Statewide constitutional prohibition Oct. 1, 1889, 
effective Nov. 2, 1889, 18,552 to 17, 393. Ratified, 1918; Senate, 43 to 2; House, 96 to 10. 

OHIO. Under Statewide constitutional prohibition, Nov. 5, 1918, 463,654 to 437, 
895, effective May 27, 1919. Ratified, 1919; Senate, 20 to 12; House, 84 to 29. 

OKLAHOMA. Under Statewide constitutional prohibition since statehood, Nov. 
16, 1907, 130,361 to 112,258. Ratified, 1919; Senate, 43 to 0; House, 90 to 8. 

OREGON. Under Statewide constitutional prohibition Nov. 3, 1914, majority 
36,340, effective Jan. 1, 1916. Nov. 7, 1916, beer amendment defeated by 53,992 ma¬ 
jority. Bone dry amendment absolutely forbidding importation of liquors for beverage 
purposes, carried by 5,255 majority—all but six counties voting for it. In 1917 Leg¬ 
islature passed drastic bone dry law in accordance with vote of the people in 1916. 
Ratified, 1919; Senate, 30 to 0; House, 53 to 3. 

PENNSYLVANIA. 14 dry counties, 53 wet, a gain during 1918 of 3 counties 
for drys. Ratified, 1919, 110 to 93; Senate, 29 to 16. 


RHODE ISLAND. 14 dry towns, 25 wet; 6 towns voted dry Nov. 5, 1918. 13 

per cent, of population and 38 per cent, of territory dry. Ratification refused. Senate 
12 to 25. Six more years to ratify. 

SOUTH CAROLINA. Under Statewide statutory prohibition. Sept. 14, 1915, 
11,954 majority, effective July 1, 1917. Ratified, 1918; Senate, 43 to 0; House, 86 to 0. 


152 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION 


SOUTH DAKOTA. Under Statewide constitutional prohibition Nov. 7, 1916, 
about 12,000 majority, effective July 1, 1917. Ratified, 1918; Senate, 43 to 0; House, 
86 to 0. 

TENNESEE. Under Statewide statutory prohibition Jan., 1909, effective July 1, 
1909. Law practically ignored in Nashville, Memphis and Chattanooga until passage 
of nuisance act in 1913. This legislation reinforced in 1915 by “ Ouster law ” for 
removal of faithless officials, and soft drink stand act, resulting in enforcement in 
cities. Under Ouster law, more than a score officials have been forced out of office. 
In 1917 an anti-storing law, an anti-shipping law, and laws increasing penalty for 
violation were passed. Ratified, 1919; Senate, 28 to 3; House, 90 to 6. 

TEXAS. Under Statewide statutory prohibition, 1918; Senate, practically unani¬ 
mous; House, 103 to 21. State Supreme Court 1918 held law a violation of constitu¬ 
tional provision, concerning local option, but attorney general kept saloons closed by 
means of injunctions, and comptroller refused to issue licenses. Legislature of 1919 
expected to submit State constitutional prohibition. Ratified, 1918; Senate, 21 to 0; 
House, 71 to 29. 

UTAH. Under Statewide statutory prohibition, Feb., 1917, effective Aug. 1, 1917, 
made constitutional, 1918. Ratified; Senate, 17 to 1; House, 47 to 1. 

VERMONT. Ninety-five per cent, or area and 80 per cent, of population under 
prohibition. Ratified, 1919; Senate, 26 to 3; House, 155 to 58. 

VIRGINIA. Under Statewide prohibition approved by people 1914, enacted by 
Legislature Feb., 1916, effective Nov. 1, 1916. Enforcement under State prohibition 
commissioner. Ratified, 1918; Senate; 32 to 5; House, 93 to 3. 

WASHINGTON. Under Statewide statutory prohibition, Nov. 3, 1914. Drastic 
law, majority 18,632, effective Jan. 1, 1916. Law prohibits sale, manufacture, giving 
away or otherwise furnishing or disposing of intoxicating liquors, or having in 
possession any intoxicating liquor or any drug or medicine containing alcohol, capable 
of being used as a beverage. In 1916, liquor interests initiated a measure to destroy 
prohibition, commonly called “ The Hotel Liquor Bill,” and a measure to permit sale 
of beer. First was defeated by majority of 189,915, receiving only 42,702, the second 
by 124,846, receiving only 89,997 votes. Prohibition made constitutional and bone dry, 
1918. Ratified, 1919; Senate, 40 to 0; House, 93 to 0. 

WEST VIRGINIA. Under Statewide constitutional prohibition, Senate 26 to 4; 
House, 88 to 5. Ratified, 1919; Senate, 30 to 0; House, 94 to 0. 

WISCONSIN. Only two counties entirely dry, 69 wet, a dry gain of one during 
year. 75 per cent, of territory and 50 per cent, of population dry. Ratified, 1918; 
Senate 19 to 11; House, 58 to 39. 

WYOMING. Under Statewide constitutional prohibition Nov. 5, 1918, effective 
Jan. 1, 1920, 31,407 to 10,206. Legislature of 1919 expected to enact statutory prohibi¬ 
tion to bring prohibition into effect during 1919. Ratified, 1919. Senate 25 to 0; 
House 53 to 0. - 

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA, TERRITORIES AND ISLANDS UNDER 
EXECUTIVE CONTROL. 

ALASKA. (Territory). Under prohibition. Requested of Congress by plebiscite, 
November 7, 1916, 9,052 to 4,835. Resulting bill approved by President Feb. 11, 1917, 
effective Jan. 1, 1918. 

CANAL ZONE. Under prohibition by Act of Congress June 18, 1918, for the 
war. Made permanent by law of Congress, February 25, 1919. 

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA. Under prohibition, Nov. 1, 1917, by Act of Con¬ 
gress, Senate 55 to 32; House, 273 to 137. Made “bone dry” by provision in revenue 
bill, 1919. 



STATISTICS OF RATIFICATION OF NATIONAL PROHIBITION 153 


GUAM. Under prohibition by order of Secretary of the Navy, Hon. Josephus 
Daniels, April 30, 1918, effective July 1, 1918. 

HAWAII (Territory). Under prohibition by Act of Congress, May 23, 1818. 

PORTO RICO (Territory). Under prohibition through referendum of people 
ordered by Congress. Popular majority 38,196; effective March 2, 1918. Legislature 
defined “ intoxicating liquors” as not including drinks of 2^2 per cent, alcohol or less. 

TUTUILA. Under prohibition by Act of Congress June 18, 1918. 

^ VIRGIN ISLANDS. Under prohibition effective July 1, 1919, by vote of local 
legislature, with exceptions for light wines and beer. 

PHILIPPINES. Practically all natives, outside of missionary churches, drink the 
native drink, tuba, made from the sap of the cocoanut palm, a mild beverage of about 
the strength of lager beer. Mothers often give it to their babies, which may partly 
explain high death rate on infants. Tuba makes the natives garrulous or even pugna¬ 
cious, but seldom “dead drunk.” The more refined and educated natives drink imported 
wines but seldom to full intoxication. American saloons are found in the large cities. 
The people have not recognized that drink lowers efficiency and some employers will 
give employees a daily ration of tuba. There is a considerable economic loss in that 
cocoanut trees are used more for drink than food. 

PHILIPPINES (Territory). “Wet.” Would have been made “dry” by enabling 
act but for parliamentary difficulty in getting vote- 


RATIFICATION STATISTICS. 

With six years allowed for ratification of national prohibition amendment, it was 
completed in 13 months. Final votes in Congress on ratification were on December 
17, 18, 1917. Ratification was completed by action of 36 States Jan. 16, 1919.. House 
submission vote, representing all the people proportionately, was 282 to 252—which was 
26 more than two-thirds. Ratifications by votes of legislators 4 2-3 to 1. Legislatures 
ratifying were many of them elected on this issue, and the majority represents un¬ 
questionably the people’s verdict not alone that of legislators. The cry of “wet” 
papers against the amendment being forced on the majority by a “minority,” looks 
ridiculous indeed when we see that the population of the three non-ratifying States, 
New Jersey, Rhode Island and Connecticut, is but five millions out of more than one 
hundred and ten millions in our total population, showing a vote of 21 to 1. 

ALLEGED OBSTACLES TO RATIFICATION CONSIDERED. 

As to the desperate cry of the liquor men for a referendum, which they have always 
opposed when it was legally possible, the Constitution plainly says amendments shall 
be ratified by votes of “ legislatures,” and it ought to be self-evident that a new device 
can not be invoked to defeat the effect of its plain provisions. 

As to that other “ straw ” the drowning traffic is snatching at, that not two-thirds 
of the whole Congress but two-thirds of a quorum voted to submit the amendment, 
the U. S. Supreme Court has just decided in an interstate commerce case that involved 
exactly the same point, that two-thirds of a quorum is sufficient. 

The prophecy that workmen will rebel if deprived of efficiency-destroying beverages 
is answered by history—there was no violence in Atlanta, Washington, Denver, 
Seattle, Detroit, when prohibition came in.^ History will rather prove the correctness 
of the prophesy of Abraham Lincoln, who in 1842, looking forward to national prohibi¬ 
tion said: “ Even the drammaker and the dramseller will have glided into other occupa¬ 
tions gradually as never to have felt the change, and will stand ready to join all others 
in the universal song of gladness. Glorious consummation.” 

As to the difficulties of enforcement—they will be much less when there are no 
“wet” border towns or States, and when FEDERAL officials are charged to enforce 
the law if local officers fail. ^ A bottle may be hidden in a bootleg but a brewery can 
not be hid in a bone dry nation. And a United States Association of Bootleggers can 
not be formed to continue the work of the U. S. Brewers Association in the political 
domination of politics. 

There is yet some fighting to do with red noses and red flags but Waterloo is won, 
and the main work remaining is to follow the anti-saloon campaign with an anti-saloon 
campaign in preparation for a “ bone dry ” nation. 

Summary Feb. 1, 1919: 32 prohibition States. Six-sevenths of counties dry. 



154 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION 


Who Won the American Prohibition Victories? 

The Church of Christ has been “ the main army ” in this crusade. Benjamin Rush, 
Lyman Beecher, Albert Barnes, Justin Edwards, Moses Stewart, Thos. P. Hunt, John 
Marsh, E. C- Delevan, Lewis Cass, Nathaniel Hewitt, Geo. B. Cheever, Charles Jewitt, 
John Pierpont, Peter Stryker, A. A. Miner, Wm. H. Burleigh, Neal Dow, “Nasby” are 
the chief “ prophets ” of the first era. “ The noble army of the martyrs,’’ from Haddock 
to Carmack, have furnished fruitful “ seed.” Of living free lances, William J. Bryan, 
Richard P. Hobson and “Billy” Sunday stand preeminent. John B. Gough, Joseph 
Cook, Geo. W. Bain, Clinton N- Howard and Geo. W. Stewart, by putting anti-liquor 
lances in popular lectures, reached thousands who would never have attended straight 
temperance lectures. Of temperance organizations, the National Temperance Society 
is entitled to congratulations as the pioneer. The W. C. T. U. is the one tireless reform 
force that has worked since 1872 for every reform in every county—in almost every 
town. The Anti-Saloon League sits at the other “ head of the table.” The Interna¬ 
tional Reform Bureau, starting its work just after the League, with a program 
as broad as that of the W. C. T. U., initiated eight of the laws Congress has passed 
against intoxicants, and has promoted prohibition every week since 1895 —its Superin¬ 
tendent from 1867 —by numerous lectures and much literature, including five temperance 
books. At the National Capital, in 1895, Dr. Wilbur F. Crafts, of the Bureau, and 
Mrs. M. D. Ellis, of the W. C- T. U., independently but co-operatively inaugurated the 
“ Christian Lobby-” Rev. E. C. Dinwiddie began to lobby for the League soon after. 
They have been recognized by three national union temperance conventions as the 
trusted legislative agents of all temperance forces. The church temperance committees, 
led by Prof. Charles Scanlon, Presbyterian, and Dr. Clarence True Wilson, Methodist, 
have helped greatly by lectures and literature. The Intercollegiate Prohibition Asso¬ 
ciation, led by Mr. D. Leigh Colvin, has wrought a great work in colleges. The “ Flying 
Squadron,” led by Governor Frank Hanly, and Hon. Oliver Stewart, had a great 
influence through its most comprehensive of prohibition lecture tours. Mr. Daniel 
Poling and Dr. Ira D. Landreth, prominent in the Squadron, permanently represent the 
Good Citizenship Department of the Christian Endeavor societies. Mrs. Zilla Foster 
Stevens, Mrs. Stella B. Irvine and Mrs. W. F. Crafts have effectively mobilized Sunday 
schools for the Anti-Alcohol war. Dr. Daniel Dorchester, Mr. Ernest Gordon, Miss 
Cora F. Stoddard, Mr. E. H. Cherrington, Mr- Harry F. Warner, have proved skillful 
“ ministers of munitions,” in the department of temperance literature. We should 
remember also the old prophetic “ Voice,” backed by Funk & Wagnalls Co., and edited 
by E. J. Wheeler, Wm. F. P-‘Ferguson and Wm. E. Johnson. The daily press has 
seldom been on the prohibition side in “wet” States, but three notably exceptions are: 
the Philadelphia North American, the Kansas City Star and the Pittsburgh Com¬ 
mercial-Gazette. 

No leading university man was identified actively with prohibition propaganda 
down to the time of the war, when the patriotic aspect of the question brought Prof. 
Irving Fisher, of Yale University very helpfully into the fight. Dr. N. S. Davis stood 
for many years almost alone among presidents of the American Medical Association 
for the discontinuance of the use of Alcohol, and especially of alcoholic drinks, as 
medicine. Dr. Howard Kelly, of the Johns Hopkins University, and Dr. Winfield S. Hall, 
of Northwestern University,^ are in the very short list of medical men of first rank 
that identified themselves with anti-alcoholic propaganda before victory was assured. 
Mrs. Elizabeth Tilton is one of the few welfare workers that in seeking to alleviate 
poverty have seen that prohibition is the “ ounce of prevention ” that is better than a 
ton of cure. A decisive part has been played by business in fighting “booze” in its 
own interest. And the work of Charles Stelzle in mobilizing labor against liquor as its 
worst foe has been important. “ Our friends the enemy,” by offensive domination of 
politics and defiance of law, have driven many of their friends to prohibition For 
“bone dry” prohibition credit belongs chiefly to our leaders on the floor of Congress, 
especially Henry W. Blair, who introduced national prohibition amendments in 1876 
and got “bone dry” one reported in 1888. In the first era the leaders were Sheppard 
and Wesley L. Jones, Representatives Webb, Barkley and Hon. C. H. Randall, the last 
named the lone prohibition Congressman, which reminds us that the Prohibition Party 
has done much for prohibition laws in State and nation, not alone by agitation but 
especially by furnishing most of the temperance leaders outside of Congress—notably 
our great orator, John G. Wooley—more recently allied with Anti-Saloon League. 


I 


TEMPERANCE STATUS OF OTHER CONTINENTS 


155 


Temperance Status of Other Continents * 

LATIN AMERICA. 

While there is a difference in the temperance status between each country and 
every other, there is a very general resemblance among the Latin Americas. People 
of Spanish antecedents do not usually drink to drunkenness though most of them drink 
wine every day. Only in recent years has it been shown that the chief evil in the use 
of intoxicants is not that it produces occasional drunkenness, but rather that even a 
moderate use of liquor stupefies “ the little white soldiers,” in the blood, the leucocytes, 
and so breaks down the defenses of the body against microbe diseases, and at the 
same time lowers industrial efficiency. In Latin America, practically all who can 
afford to do so drink wine more or less every day, without any compunction of con¬ 
science or thought of its being in any way improper. Agitation of prohibition in 
North America, and especially the recognition of the effect of drink upon efficiency in 
war time has no doubt compelled some consideration by a few thoughtful leaders. 
Some people in these Latin Americas have seen that intoxicating drinks, especially 
the white man’s drinks, are harmful to the Indians, and as they are in many cases 
the industrial workers, prohibition of the sale of liquor to Indians has been in a few 
instances put on the statute books. Such laws, however, are seldom well enforced 
as there are always white men ready to turn over drink to the Indians for a profit 
And in South America, as in Asia and Africa and Oceanica, it has been conclusively 
proved that prohibition applying only to one section of the adult population is of 
very little effect. 

There is a beginning of effort towards total abstinence and prohibition in South 
America that should be strongly encouraged by the circulation of appropriate literature 
and, whenever possible, by tactful lecturers speaking preferably in the native tongue. 
Porto Rico’s campaign for prohibition, inaugurated by the International Reform 
Bureau, of which the native people soon took charge, carrying prohibition by a large 
majority, should be considered a “demonstration” for similar campaigns in all other 
Latin Americas. There is further encouragement in that Panama been put under 
prohibition by the U. S. Government, and in the enactment of prohibition in two 
Provinces of Mexico, Sonora and Chihuahua. Yucatan has also voted in favor of 
national prohibition for all Mexico. (See prohibition argument for Latin America p. 133.) 

There are a few anti-alcohol societies in South America, and in several of the 
Latin Americas branches of the W. C. T. U are promoting abstinence. The President 
of Peru has declared in favor of much greater restriction of the liquor traffic, and a 
prize of $500 has been offered for the best text book for teaching scientific temperance 
in the schools. The International Reform Buerau has secured the translation of the 
Hank Book of Facts About Alcohol, prepared by the Scientific Temperance Federation,, 
as a suitable book to put into the hands of statesmen, preachers, and teachers, and 
other leaders all over Latin America, also in Spain and the Philippines. And the book 
“ Shall We Spare Beer and Wine,” prepared by the same scientific authority, ought to 
be translated and circulated by the million as it exactly meets the chief obstacle to 
prohibition among all the Latin races of the world, the feeling that the use of wine is 
relatively harmless because the amount of alcohol in a single glass is smaller than in a 
glass of distilled liquor. This book conclusively shows, from scientific experiments, 
that a “ wine and beer quantity of alcohol ” diminishes efficiency of body and mind. 

*In the March, 1919, issue of the 20th Century Quarterly (206 Pa. Av., s. e., Washington, D. C.) 
there is a “ Temperance Inspection Tour of the World ” in which an imaginary party makes a de^ilea 
examination of every country, starting in Canada, traveling South to Cape Horn, then via Panama Canal 
to Greenland, Iceland, Great Britain, Portugal, Spain, North to Sweden, through Germany to -Italy, 
North through new nations cut from Austria-Hungary and Russia, then east to China and Japan, South to 
Siam, India, Australia, then to Persia, the Balkans and Africa. 




156 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION 


EUROPE. 

There are very great differences between European countries in drinking usages, 
the most marked being the fact that Southern Europe, with a warmer climate, has less 
drunkenness than Northern Europe; and that is doubtless one reason why Northern 
Europe has outrun Southern Europe in movements for abstinence and prohibition. 
Scandanavia was the first large section of Europe to give its people home rule or 
** self determination ” on the liquor question. The benefits that scholars at a distance 
and some people in those countries ascribe to government ownership and so-called 
disinterested management ” through the company system or Gothenburg plan have 
been shown to be really due to local option. Considerable areas in Denmark and 
Norway and Sweden have outlawed the saloon by local option, and derive the same 
benefits from it that have become so famous in Massachusetts and other parts of the 
United States. 

The war has led even this northern section of Europe to prohibit distilled liquors 
to a considerable extent, to save food, and there is a strong tide running in favor of 
complete prohibition. A few years ago the Premier of Sweden declared for prohibi¬ 
tion, but the power of the liquor traffic has been sufficient to hold back the victory 
which seemed to be at hand. Another northern country of Europe, Scotland, has 
secured local option under the name of the Permissive Bill, and during 1920 the Scotch 
will have opportunities to vote whether local communities shall be wet or dry. 

In Belgium, France, Italy and Switzerland, absinthe is forbidden as the worst form 
of distilled liquors, and during the war considerable prohibition of other distilled 
liquors was decreed among the belligerents of Central Europe on both sides. There 
was some restrictions of beer and wine also but only to save food, and it can not be 
reasonably expected that these restrictions will continue in time of peace unless those 
who believe that all forms of intoxicating liquors are harmful to the individual and 
to the nation bestir themselves to a swift and strong campaign of education. The 
need of such educational work is strikingly shown in the fact that in February, 1919, 
the British Government relaxed its wartime restrictions of liquors, and allowed a 25 
per cent increase in the barrelage of beer and a three-fold increase in the gravity, so 
turning over to the workingmen at a time of perilous social unrest a larger quantity 
of liquors of stronger quality, which, while intended to mollify the industrial unrest, is 
more likely to invite violence by which it will be greatly aggravated. The workingmen 
of Great Britain, in 27 war plebiscites on prohibition which were held in the leading 
industrial centers of England, Scotland, and Wales, voted by large majorities, 
totalling two and a half to one, for war prohibition. And there are indications, 
especially in many strong utterances of labor leaders, that the working class, instead of 
being determined to have beer at any cost, are ready for prohibition, a majority of them, 
more ready than any other portion of the community. The reason why war prohibi¬ 
tion, despite strong support, was not enacted is undoubtedly the large number of 
people who have financial interests in the liquor business, and the fact that many of 
the brewers and distillers are influential members of the “ beerage ” in Parliament. 

While Europe lags behind North America in legislation, it has more organizations 
for promotion of total abstinence among young and old, and eminent scientific men 
are more active in educational propganda whose central “ motif" is that even the 
most moderate use of the mildest wine and beer materially impairs physical health 
and mental efficiency. This purely educational work with no aid from law, in the first 
dozen years of the twentieth century, increased the organized abstainers in Germany 
from almost nothing to one hundred thousand, and reduced the per capita consumption 
of beer twenty-nine quarts. 


TEMPERANCE STATUS OF OTHER CONTINENTS 157 

Must Save New Republics from Brewers* Domination. 

The problem of prohibition in Europe is made especially urgent by the fact that 
dozen new republics are springing up in the center of Europe, composed of races that 
have long been subject to the despotic domination of stronger races. In order to- 
hold their own in the new era it is manifest they must conserve their resources, 
financially, and develop their manhood to the highest possible degree. The President 
of the Czecho-Slovaks, in a masterful address (p. 134) has shown the importance of' 
prohibition, exposing the fallacies of those who think that there is no harm in drink, 
unless one becomes helplessly intoxicated. He will undoubtedly lead that brave 
people to prohibition unless the powerful liquor interest takes an active part in secret 
opposition. Therefore one of the important methods of inducing the republics of 
Central Europe to adopt prohibition is the publication in their languages of the 
U. S. Senate investigation of plots of the brewers. (See p. 148.) They need prohibition 
not so much to protect the health of their bodies as the very life of the body politic. 

It should strongly reenforce prohibition campaigns at this time, that millions in 
Europe and other parts of the world are short of food and every pound of grain 
or fruit or vegetables that is rotted for making intoxicants it taken from those who 
are dying of hunger. 

ASIA. 

Asia should be cordially credited with the inauguration of prohibition. Centuries 
before the Maine law was enacted, the religious leaders of India and of Arabia, in 
both of which there was much drunkenness, laid hold of the problem with a wisdom 
that was wholly lacking in the early efforts of Europe and the United States. Instead 
of attempting to stop drunkenness by exhorting its victims to moderation,, or by 
licensing the drink under pretense of restriction, which is always defeated by com¬ 
bining it with revenue, the leaders of religion said, “ Stop drinking,” and the leaders in 

government said, ” Stop selling,” and they left no drug stores in the rear, with the result 
that fully one-third of the human race under the Hindu, Buddhist, and Mohammedan 

religions, all of which had made prohibition a part of their creed and law, were for 

centuries free from the very taint of alcohol. And these half billion people are still 
most of them abstainers, the exceptions being largely those who have been in close 
contact with the white man in military and civil affairs of government, in commerce^ 
and in the universities which the white races have established under secular man¬ 
agement, independent of missionary influence. 

It should be said parenthetically in this connection that the one great race of 
Asia that has no distinctively total-abstinence religion, the Chinese, came under 
prohibition far back in the fourth century, through imperial edicts. The millions of 
China were generally free from both opium and intoxicating drinks until opium was 
forced on the Chinese by the dominant white race—a living refutation of the theory 
that all races have an irresistible craving for intoxicants. 

Liquors, too, came to be tolerated, probably from the feeling that the white man 
would not allow prohibition; but the Chinese have never been greatly addicted to drunk-* 
enness, and even now the increasing liquor peril in China is not much recognized by 
them. It is one of the cases where the maxim is most appropriate, “ Prevention is 
better than cure.” The avowed purpose of the American brewers to transfer their 
machinery to China, to capture the lost opium market has partially awakened the 
sleeping giant, who may some day show a Samson’s revenge in dealing with those 
who wrong him. Those who know the characteristics of the brewers as uncovered 
by the United States Senate investigation know they will transfer to China not only 
their machinery but their machinations—their secret devices for the control of 
democracies. 


158 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION 


One of the most interesting temperance studies in Asia, in the light of the Peace 
-Congress proposals, is India, where the British have aggressively promoted the liquor 
traffic against the protest of people to whom prohibition and abstinence are religious 
•duties. This course has been on the face of it a most unwise and dangerous proceeding 
and will be still more so now that the people can appeal to the “ self-determination of 
peoples." If India is not sufficiently developed for full self-government, certainly its 
expressed wishes in the matter of prohibition should be regarded, and it is hoped that 
they will make an appeal against the British license system, though not in the form of 
war, to “ a decent regard for the opinions of mankind." There are more than a hun¬ 
dred temperance organizations in India, made up of Hindus, Buddhists, Mohammedans, 
and Christians, who are working for deliverance of India’s peoples from the British 
license system. They are refused even local option; But now that the Peace Congress 
has opened the way for appeal to the world court of public opinion they should ask 
that the British shall restore their prohibition of intoxicating liquors, that India may 
enjoy, under her native religions, that which is now known to be, by the tests of 
science and business and politics, the best policy for the development of that people 
into a full civilization of the American type. The Peace Congress says emphatically 
that native people’s shall not be exploited by their white rulers, who are required to 
make it their chief concern to promote the welfare of these native races. Great Britain 
can not reconcile that doctrine with its licensed rum and opium in India. 

Since above was written there has come to the writer’s attention a 1916 pamphlet 
prepared by Graduates Club of the Madras Y. M. C. A., ntitled, “ The Temperance 
Section of the Madras Health Exhibit." It reports liquor investigations of the club 
including a count of patrons seen to enter the local toddy and arrack shops on one 
afternoon between 4 and 9 P. M. which indicates an average daily patronage of 12,000 
Hindu males, 1,570 females and 1,640 "juveniles”; 955 Mohammedans; 6,300 “Christ¬ 
ians." At the arrack shops the daily figures for same hours are 15,030 Hindus, 670 
Mohammedans, 1,670 " Christians.” These are for busiest hours, but the totals for 
whole day, if available would be much larger. Number of licensed shops in India w’as 
reduced from 32,367 in 1906 to 24,588 in 1916, but in the same period the revenue, 
the per capita consumption and the convictions for drunkenness all increased—an in¬ 
structive story for those who rely on “ reduction ’’ instead of prohibition to cure the 
drink evil. 

AUSTRALIA. 

Australia and New Zealand rank next to North America in development of 
prohibition legislation. The writer found a few years since that while Great Britain 
and Germany both drank twice as much per capita as the United States, and Belgium 
most of all, Canada’s per capita was only one-fourth and Australisia’s only three-fourths 
of the United States figure. Nevertheless drink has been a great and growing evil in 
the social front of the world. Increasing areas have been put under prohibition by the 
slow process of local option, despite the hard requirement of a three-fourth majority. 
It is not a square deal where majority rule decides everything else. In every high- 
grade democracy, even a good sport, much more a good citizen accepts defeats by one 
vote as graciously as if it were ten thousand. The International Reform Bureal has 
loaned its Foreign Field Secretary, Prof. John A. Nicholls, for the campaign, and has 
backed him up with literature for leaders. New South Wales is expected to be next to 
vote for province wide prohibition. Tasmania has failed by a vote or two to grant a 
'■referendum. 

OCEANICA. 

The situation in the various islands of the Pacific inhabited by aboriginal races is 
jquite similar. In some instances the natives when first brought into contact with the 


TEMPERANCE STATUS OF OTHER CONTINENTS 


159 


white man had some simple native drink, wine or beer, made out of native fruits or 
grains, which was mildly intoxicating when used in large quantity, but was seldom 
so used except at some special festival. When missionaries came, the use of these 
native intoxicants was easily given up. But in nearly all instances the white men seized 
the opportunity to sell their own stronger drinks. They very soon developed the 
heartless theory that from the selfish viewpoint of trade it was best to provide a very 
raw drink that would hold the native captive, so that when he had once learned to 
like it he could not let it alone, and would sacrifice all that he possessed to buy a 
supply at frequent intervals. -From the standpoint of general commerce and useful 
trade it was manifestly a very stupid procedure, for in the first place it killed the 
buying power of the natives; and in the second place it very soon killed the buyers 
themselves. A man who became enslaved to drink bought very few clothes or tools 
or utensils, and very little of the other supplies of civilization, whereas if he had been 
protected against these intoxicants and developed in industrial habits he would have 
become an increasingly large purchaser of all the common appliances of civilized life. 

The Fiji Islands are one of the island groups that the writer has personally in¬ 
vestigated. There the Methodist missionaries overcame the habit of cannibalism and 
developed a delightful Arcadian population, about one hundred thousand in all, of 
whom ninety thousand are Methodists and the other ten thousands Catholics—not an 
idol worshipper left among them. Under proper guidance by the supervising govern¬ 
ment they would be a very industrious and completely sober people. But those whom 
the British have sent there to govern have insisted on having their own drinks, and the 
law prohibiting the sale to the natives in the interest of their industrial efficiency, 
has been so poorly enforced, that, without any increases in the white population, there 
has been a very large increase year by year in the sale of liquors, which is conclusive 
proof, as the whites have not perceptibly changed their customs, that some of them 
are selling the drink, probably with the connivance of the officials, to the natives, who 
are considerably injured by it despite the restraining influence of a sincere acceptance 
of Christian religions. 

Another case which is typical, to which the writer has given much attention, is that 
of the New Hebrides, where British missionaries from Australia developed exemplary 
life among former cannibals, that reached such a point that there was scarcely a 
crime committed, and scarcely a law or an officer needed. But British and American 
and French traders came in, and thinking only what would be business from the white 
man’s standpoint, wholly regardless of the interest of the natives, sold them guns and 
rum; and these savages, with a gun in one hand and a rum bottle in the other, became 
like wild maniacs in their drunken revels. They would shoot children connected with 
the missions in the trees as if they had been birds, and many of them relapsed into 
savagery under the influence of the drink. Dr. John Paton, the beloved missionary, 
came twice to the United States to plead with the people to induce the government to 
call off the American traders, at least so far as the sale of intoxicating drinks was 
concerned, and the Gillett law was secured through the influence of the International 
Reform Bureau for this purpose; but it had scarcely gone into effect, much to the joy 
of Dr. Paton, when the French and British established a joint protectorate, and then 
French liquors, not only strong wines, but brandy, must be sold. 

In these and all the other islands of the Pacific the new doctrine of the Peace 
Congress of 1919, that colones must be conducted chiefly in the interest of the native 
races the white governers acting as guardian mandatories in behalf of the League of 
Nations—should bring prohibition. 


160 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION 


AFRICA. 

Drunkenness in Africa is mostly due to the white man’s example and his promotion 
of the drink traffic. He has partly broken down the abstinence of Mohammedans, and 
has led the other races that used mild native drinks to take instead the maddening 
drinks brought by the white man. Nations that have established colonies in Africa: 
British, Portugese, French and German, have made a very similar record of debauching 
the natives for revenue. 

The situation is in many cases greatly aggravated by the use of gin or some other 
drink as currency. The poor negro is paid for his day’s wages in certain quantity of 
gin. The effects upon the negro in diminishing his industrial efficiency has become 
so serious that in many colonies a law has been made prohibiting the sale to natives 
but allowing the continued sale to white men. Such legislation, as is before stated is 
seldom effective, as there are nearly always white men at hand who are willing to 
transfer liquors to the natives for their own profit. One of the convictions that will 
force itself on any open-minded man that reads the story of Africa is that the only 
effective way to protect the native is to have full prohibition for the entire population 
after the fashion adopted by the United States for Indian Territory. 

In order to reduce industrial losses due to drink, and perhaps in some measure to 
satisfy the consciences of some men who are not quite content to debauch the native 
races, the European nations have met repeatedly in international conference at Brussels 
to restrict traffic in distilled liquors in Africa. Except in the one case when seventeen 
nations established the Congo Prohibition Zone “ because of the material and moral 
injury wrought by the liquor traffic among the native races,” they have taken the 
ineffective method of increasing the tax on liquors, but this increase of taxes has not 
even kept pace with the decreased cost of transportation due to the introduction of 
railroads and other facilities, so that there has been no appreciable benefit from these 
conventions. 

An interesting example of how this effort to combine restriction and revenue 
works out is the present situation in South Africa, where a British government com¬ 
mittee has reported in favor of repealing the law against selling liquors to natives on 
the ground that a great many of the white men are sent to jail for violating it, and 
therefore it should be admitted that prohibition does not prohibit, and the law should 
be put aside, and the criminals licensed to go on with their speakeasies under govern¬ 
ment sanction. The real motive back of this is the desire of quite respectable wine 
farmers, many of them prominent in South African churches, to secure the profit of 
an enlarged wine business. 

The British churches and missionary societies are making a strong fight against 
this proposed action, and should be strongly reenforced, especially by Americans. 

The largest ray of hope for Africa is the brief intimation in one of the articles of 
the League of Nations that the principle is accepted by fourteen nations that are a 
party to that tentative League that colonies should not be exploited, but administered 
chiefly in the interest of the native people themselves and only secondarily for the 
profit of the nations that have established or are controlling the colonies, which in the 
future are to be considered “mandatories,” that is, guardians, and held accountable by 
the League of Nations for just and humane administration that shall promote the 
real welfare of the natives themselves. If the humane people of civilized nations will 
seize on this opportunity to compel a full observance of this accepted principle, it 
would seem that complete prohibition of the sale of the white man’s drinks at any rate 
might be achieved for Africa as a part of the peace settlement, and then a great cam¬ 
paign of education should be undertaken to prepare the way in short order for the 
establishment of prohibition of native beer and wine also, without which only a very 
inadequate alleviation for the evils of intemperance can be secured in that or any other 
continent. 


WHY NATIONAL CONSTITUTIONAL PROHIBITION? 


161 


Why National Constitutional Prohibition? 

By Mr. Wayne B. Wheeler, and General Counsel of 
Anti Saloon League of America. 

[This address was made in 1917, before the constitutional amendment was ratified, but 
it is still pertinent to justify the amendment and show why prohibition in 
every land should be nation-wide.] 



The Speaker Introduced. 

A measure which is of such vital importance to the nation and to coming genera¬ 
tions should be written in our basic law, where it will be as far removed as possible 
from the danger of repeal in the changes of party politics. 

A National Evil Requires a National Remedy. 

The liquor traffic is a national evil. Our interstate commerce relations make it so. 
The railroads, the automobile and other means of communication make neighbors of 
the people in adjoining states. The evil effects of liquor cannot, therefore, be con¬ 
fined within state boundaries. The alcoholic may become intoxicated in one state and 
with the easy accessible means of transportation commit crime or become a public 
charge in another state. It is as impossible to confine the evils of the liquor traffic 
within state boundaries as it is to confine the odors of a soap factory to the premises 
on which the factory is located. 

Recent, scientific investigations have placed liquor in a class with habit-forming 
drugs. The states found that they could not cope with the evils of the drug habit by 
state action alone. It took the federal Harrison anti-narcotic law to give adequate 
relief. The national policy in dealing with habit-forming drugs is to prohibit them 
except upon prescription of reputable physicians, yet we permit the most dangerous 
drug, alcohol, to be dispensed by unscrupulous and ignorant men to thousands who 
are ignorant of the danger of such poison beverages. The National Prohibition Move¬ 
ment merely says, “ Put all dangerous drugs under like control.” 




163 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION 


Years ago the state realized that they could not adequately protect themselves 
against the infection of contagious diseases by state action alone. The Federal Govern¬ 
ment had to step in and make the movement nation-wide. 

State boundaries are not adequate barriers to moral contagion and no state careless 
in such matters should be permitted to dump its drunks or other social and moral 
derelicts over the border into a neighboring state. Such interstate relations call for 
national action. 

The effects of the liquor traffic are national, and the remedy must be as far- 
reaching as the evil. The patch must be as big as the sore. 

National Prohibition Necessary to Safeguard Democracy. 

One of the greatest purposes of the war is to “make the world safe for democracy.” 
If the United States is to be made safe for democracy, not only Kaiserism abroad but 
booze autocracy at home must go. The liquor traffic is our greatest menace to the 
two essentials for a safe democrary, patriotism and clean politics. Patriotism is founded 
on intelligence and morality. Science and sense prove that liquor is a deadly foe to the 
brain, the seat of intelligence. As an organized traffic it decreases the number who 
attend schools, colleges and other places of learning. As a beverage for the individual, 
it weakens the brain cells and dulls the intellect. The New York Health Department 
in a recent bulletin said, “ Civilized man is brute animal plus high brain development. 
Alcohol destroys the high brain development and leaves the brute animal.” A democ¬ 
racy is safe only when the individual citizen has a clear brain to help administer the 
Government and solve its problems, and a moral viewpoint to guide his intelligence 
into proper channels. 

The brewery and liquor interests are the foe to clean politics, another essential 
to a successful democracy. 

The Milwaukee Journal, by no means a prohibition paper, made the following 
comment upon the brewers’ activities in politics and their conviction in the Federal 
Court at Pittsburgh: 

“ The charge under which these brewers were punished was that they raised and 
spent a fund exceeding $1,000,000 to influence the election of a United States Senator, 
and thirty-six members of the lower House of Congress. The whole thing is stagger¬ 
ing. Here was an attempt to debauch the electorate of a great commonwealth, to buy 
seats in the halls of Congress and to pervert to sordid and selfish purposes the gov¬ 
ernment of the Nation. It was not only done in violation of law, but it is destructive 
of representative government.” (See in Index, “Brewers Political Activities.” 

Liquor Allied With Disloyalty. 

In time of war the patriotic forces of the Government must stand united for the 
country. Any factor in our civilization which is disloyal to the Government or aids 
disloyalty should be eliminated both for times of war and of peace. When patriots 
are saving the crumbs and gathering up the scraps to save food to win the war, the 
liquor traffic demands its millions of bushels of grain to make a beverage which de¬ 
creased our chances to win the war. It is a constant menace to the man-power of the 
nation because it shortens the lives of the alcoholics, weakens their endurance and 
undermines their health. The liquor traffic is a German submarine on this side of the 
sea, destroying the two essentials to victory, food supply and man power. It is a traitor 
within our camp which must be driven out to hasten a victory for democracy and 
civilization. 


WHY NATIONAL CONSTITUTIONAL PROHIBITION? 


163 


The German-American Alliance became so obnoxious to the better class of Germans 
in this country in recent years, that it has been repudiated by those who are more in 
sympathy with American ideals. Multiplied thousands of Germans who have caught 
the spirit of American freedom and civil liberty are opposed to the beverage liquor 
traffic and to that sort of Germanism which stands for “ prsonal liberty,” as German 
brewers interpret it, namely, license, licentiousness and liquor. 

If America can conscript millions of our best citizens to fight the battles to make 
democracy safe abroad, in the name of the same kind of patriotism we must eliminate 
the institution which makes democracy unsafe at home. 

Lawlessness of Traffic Requires National Prohibition. 

National Prohibition is necessary in order to secure an honest enforcement of law 
against the liquor traffic in the nation. The liquor traffic is a lawless traffic. It opposes 
every law which restricts or prohibits the traffic as well as their enforcement. Liquor 
dealers, of course, claim that they favor certain restrictions and local prohibitions, but 
these are only favored in the places where the people are fighting for a larger prohibi¬ 
tion. Whenever a state votes ” dry ” the brewers and allied liquor forces in neighbor¬ 
ing states do their best to bring the law into contempt and to smuggle liquor^ into 
that state in defiance of the spirit and letter of the law. They fight national prohibition 
in the name of ” state rights,” and then by their lawless action violate every state’s 
right to have its own law enforced without interference from the law-breaking liquor 
traffic on the outside. They claim that prohibition does not prohibit, and then do their 
level best to break the law so that their lawless claim shall be in part true. Wherever 
they control enforcement officials, the law against liquor is not enforced. 

Wherever such officials unexpectedly enforce the law, as did the Mayor of Chicago, 
the liquor interests, and the united societies allied with them protest that the enforce¬ 
ment of the law is an invasion of their property. In Chicago, on Nov. 7, 1915, 41,386 
persons were in line as a protest against law enforcement. They were so accustomed 
to having officials violate their oath of office in response to their demands that the 
enforcement of the Sunday closing law was denounced as an invasion of property. 
In nearly every state brewers are prohibited from owning saloons. In New Jersey, 
reports show that about 80% of the saloons are owned by the brewers. Brewers and 
liquor dealers secretly or openly violate practically every law on the statute books. 
When we face a foe that refuses to be regulated or controlled or to obey the law, 
there is but one consistent position for the National Government to take and that is abso¬ 
lute prohibition of the traffic. A lawless traffic cannot be harbored by a single state 
without lowering the standard of law enforcement in the other states. 

Logic of Progress Demands National Prohibition. 

Great movements founded on righteous principles constantly move forward. The 
progress of truth is absolutely irresistible. The rapidly advancing prohibition sentiment 
indicate that prohibition is based upon truth and righteousness. Ten years ago there 
were only three dry states in the Union. Today twenty-six states have abolished the 
liquor traffic. Six-sevenths of the counties of the United States have prohibited saloons 
and more than 15,000 villages and cities have gone dry. This means that more than 
87% of the territory of the nation is free from the lawless, un-American, unpatriotic 
liquor traffic. 

The majority of the people have a right to claim immunity from the evils 
encouraged by the minority. 


164 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION 


Over 60% of the population of the United States have determined upon prohibition 
as the best policy of Government. The inherent la^vlessness and viciousness of the 
traffic requires that this progress continue. The states and territory that has already 
gone dry cannot get the full fruits of victory as long as a single state harbors this 
lawless traffic within its border. The great wet centers are the cess pools of corruption 
and the centers of lawlessness from which the life-blood of the nation may be poisoned. 
Twentieth century, up-to-date, scientific methods find the cause of a disease and elimi¬ 
nate that as the ultimate duty to the public. The territory that has already abolished 
the saloon has proven the success of the policy and furnishes an unanswerable argument 
why the nation should follow its example. It is unfair to the states that are doing 
their best to fight a great national evil to handicap them in that fight by protecting 
this evil in a few localities in the nation and spread the evil which the large majority 
of the country has abolished. Intelligent citizens are not satisfied to drive back the 
disease-breeding mosquitoes to the swamps from 'which they came. They drain the 
swamps and thus protect the health of the citizens throughout the surrounding ter¬ 
ritory, and leave a heritage of health to future generations. The great “ wet ” swamps 
of the nation must be drained out if our country is to fulfill her mission. “ States' 
rights ” must always give way to humanity’s rights. 

National Prohibition Necessary to Carry Out Purpose of Government. 

The purpose of the Federal Government is set forth in the preamble of the 
Constitution and in its various sections. One of these purposes is “ to promote the 
general welfare.” The courts tell us that this means the protection of the public 
health and the public morals. In fact, all of our rights, property rights, are held 
subject to this power of the people to protect their health and morals, the two 
essentials to organized society. This was the pronouncement of Justice Bradley years 
ago. The liquor traffic is a menace both to the health and the morals of the people. 
Every health department tells us that alcohol weakens or destroys every cell of the 
human body with which it comes in contact, making the user of it more liable to dis¬ 
ease, making it less possible for him to recover from disease, and less efficient mentally 
and physically. That it menaces the morals of the people, every jail, penitentiary, 
reformatory and institution for human wreckage gives ample proof. 

Fourteen times the court of last resort in this nation has stated that the liquor 
traffic is such a source of crime and misery, such a menace to the health and morals 
of the people, that “IT HAS NO INHERENT RIGHT TO EXIST AT AEE” in 
the state or in the nation. 

The liquor traffic exists in our nation today because the people give it a permit 
which it has no inherent right to have. If the health and the morals of the people 
are essential to the perpetuity of the Government, as they are; if the liquor traffic is a 
menace to them, as it is; how can we be loyal to the “ Old Flag,” and to the govern¬ 
ment under which we live, and how can we carry out the purpose of this government if 
we protect and license this drunkard-making, selfish, disloyal, lawless, youth-corrupting 
and crime-producing traffic? 

FOR EVERY REASON, THAT WE WANT OUR DEMOCRACY TO BE 
SAFE, OUR PATRIOTISM TO BE PURE, OUR POLITICS TO BE CLEAN, 
OUR LAWS TO BE ENFORCED, OUR GOVERNMENT TO BE STRONG, 

• AND THE GENERAL WELFARE TO BE PROMOTED, THE CONSTITU¬ 
TIONAL PROHIBITION AMENDMENT SHOULD BE ADOPTED, AND THE 
LIQUOR TRAFFIC ABOLISHED. 


POLITICAL ACTIVITIES OF BREWERS 


165 


Political Activities of Brewers 

(From Congressional Record, Sept. 19, 1918.) 

Mr. JONES of Washington. Mr. President, I submit a Senate resolu¬ 
tion and ask for its immediate consideration. 

The resolution (S. Res. 307) was read, as follows: 

Whereas, Hon. A. Mitchell Palmer, Custodian of Alien Property, on or 
about September 14, made the following statement: 

“ The facts will soon appear which will conclusively show that 12 or 15 
German brewers of America, in association with the United Brewers' Associa¬ 
tion, furnished the money, amounting to several hundred thousand dollars, to 
buy a great newspaper in one of the chief cities of the Nation; and its pub¬ 
lisher, without disclosing whose money had bought that organ of public 
opinion, in the very Capital of the Nation, in the shadow of the Capitol itself, 
has been fighting the battle of liquor traffic. 

When the traffic, doomed though it is, undertakes and seeks by these 
secret methods to control party nominations, party machinery, whole political 
parties, and thereby control the government of State and Nation, it is time the 
people know the truth. 

“ The organized liquor traffic of the country is a vicious interest because 
it has been unpatriotic, because it has been pro-German in its sympathies and 
its conduct. Around these great brewery organizations owned by rich men, 
almost all of them of German birth and sympathy, at least before we entered 
the war, has grown up the societies, all the organizations of this country in¬ 
tended to keep young German immigrants from becoming real American 
citizens. 

“ It is around the sangerfests and sangerbunds and organizations of that 
kind, generally financed by the rich brewers, that the young Germans who 
come to America are taught to remember first, the fatherland, and, second, 
America," and 

Whereas, it has been publicly and repeatedly charged against the United 
States Brewers' Association and allied brewing companies and interests that 
there is in the Department of Justice and in the office of a certain United 
States district attorney evidence showing— 

That the said United States Brewers' Association, brewing companies, 
allied interests have in recent years made contributions to political campaigns 
on a scale without precedent in the political history of the country and in 
violation of the laws of the land; 

That, in order to control legislation in State and Nation, they have 
exacted pledges from candidates to office, including Congressmen and United 
States Senators, before election, such pledges being on file; 

That, in order to influence public opinion to their ends, they have heavily 
subsidized the public press and stipulated when contracting for advertising 
space with the newspapers that a certain amount be editorial space, the literary 
material for the space being provided from the brewers’ central office in New 
York; 


166 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION 


That, in order to suppress expressions of opinion hostile to their trade 
and political interests, they have set in operation an extensive system of boy¬ 
cotting of American manufacturers, merchants, railroads, and other interests; 

That, for the furthering of their political enterprises, they have erected 
a political organization to carry out their purposes; 

That they were allied to powerful suborganizations, among them the 
German-American Alliance, whose charter was revoked by the unanimous 
vote of Congress; the National Association of Commerce and Labor, and the 
manufacturers’ and dealers’ associations; and that they have their ramifica¬ 
tions in other organizations apparently neutral in character. 

That they have on file political surveys of States, counties and districts, 
tabulating the men and forces for and against them, and that they have paid 
large sums of money to citizens of the United States to advocate their cause 
and interests, including some in the Government employ; 

That they have defrauded the Federal Government by applying to their 
political corruption funds money which should have gone to the Federal 
Treasury in taxes; 

That they are attempting to build up in the country through the control 
of such organizations as the United States Societies and by the manipulation 
of the foreign language press a political influence which can be turned to one 
or the other party, thus controlling electoral results; 

That they, or some of their organizations, have pleaded nolo contendere 
to charges filed against them and have paid fines aggregating large sums of 
money; Therefore be it 

Resolvedf That the Committee on the Judiciary of the Senate, or any sub¬ 
committee thereof, is hereby authorized and directed to call upon the Hon. 
A. Mitchell Palmer, Alien Property Custodian, and the Department of Justice 
and its United States district attorneys to produce the evidence and docu¬ 
ments relating to the charges herein mentioned," and to subpoena any wit¬ 
nesses or documents relating thereto that it may find necessary, and to make 
a report of the result of such investigation and what is shown thereby to the 
Senate of the United States as promptly as possible. 

The VICE PRESIDENT. Is there objection to the present considera¬ 
tion of the resolution? 

The resolution was considered by unanimous consent and agreed to. 

[Those who desire to get full report of this epoch-making investigation 
of the efforts of organized brewers to dominate legislation and prevent law 
enforcement by boycotting and other forms of terrorism should apply each to 
his own Senator for a free copy. As the first volume is 1,387 pages, an abridge- 
has been made by the author of “ Why Dry? ” in 72 octavo pages, of which a 
single copy can be had free on application to Hon. C. H. Randall, M. C., Room 
318 House Bldg, (there is another “C. H. Randall, M. C.”), Washington, D. C. 
These will be sent to individual addresses at $7 per 100. A syllabus of the 
same can be secured by applying, with stamp, to Hon. Wayne B. Wheeler, 
Bliss Bldg., Washington, D. C. Help us to mail these to key men all over 
the world, especially in the new democracies, as a warning, at cost of $100 
per 1,000. Contributions may be sent to Rev. Wilbur F. Crafts, Ph. D., 206 
Pennsylvania Ave., s. e., Washington, D. C.] 


SECRET DOMINATION OF THE BREWERIES 


167 


America’s Marvelous Escape from the Secret 
Domination of the Breweries. 

Address of Wayne B, Wheeler, LL.D., General Counsel of the Anti-Saloon League of 
America, at Proivdence, R. I., Shubert Theatre, Sunday Afternoon, Jan. 26, 1919. 

January 16th, 1919, will go down in history as “Ratification Day” with November 
11th, “Armistice Day” and July 4th, “Independence Day.” 

To many it hardly seems possible that the legalized liquor traffic is dead in the 
Nation. In the light of the revelations of the investigation still pending in the Judiciary 
Committee of the United States Senate the victory is nothing less than a miracle. 
That investigation reveals the methods used by the liquor interests to control this coun¬ 
try. The foundation of their system was a survey made of the State by a camouflage 
organization called the Association of Commerce and Labor. Every leader in politics 
and business was listed and every fact ascertained that would disclose how he could 
be reached and controlled. The purpose was to use this when a crisis was on to 
control such persons to protect the liquor traffic. If a business man opposed them 
he was at once put on the black list for a boycott. Here are some of the firms black¬ 
listed: H. J. Heinz, the pickle king, because he was President of a Sunday School 
Association which declared for temperance; John Wanamaker, because he encouraged 
individual temperance among his employees; The Delaware-Lackawanna railroad be¬ 
cause it enforced rigid rules against drinking by its employees, after a wreck that 
destroyed many lives and cost heavily in damages, which was found to be due to drink. 
The record even shows that they black-listed the Blackstone Hotel in Chicago because 
it refused to keep its bar open on Sunday in violation of the law, as other liquor 
dealers were doing. 

The tyranny of this un-American system was never equalled in this or any other 
country. It hastened the over-throw of the traffic. 

They used the same methods to control or destroy politicians. They followed 
them relentlessly for years to pay off old scores. It mattered not what faithful service 
they had rendered the people generally, if a politician was against liquor he must 
politically die. Millions of money were collected by an assessment plan to operate a 
corrupt political system until politics and saloon-dominated centers became a stench 
in the nostrils of decent people. 

They reached out to control the agencies that mold public opinion. Some papers 
were subsidized by large advertising contracts for beer, with this string to them—they 
must use brewery-made editorials. In other instances, brewers furnished the money 
in secret to buy the papers and thus control both news and editorial policy. The 
evidence shows that the Washington Times, the Newark Ledger and Montgomry 
Advertiser were thus controlled and used. The foreign language press was in part 
controlled through a general manager who took their brewery advertisements 
and then published articles prepared by the brewers and signed by others as original 
articles. The opinion and sentiment of foreigners was thus poisoned against the 
highest ideals of this nation. Mr. John Koren, who wrote for the Atlantic Monthly and 
other magazines, was on their pay-roll for $5,000 a year. Every agency and avenue 
that could influence public thought was subsidized if it was possible. 


168 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION 


They allied themselves with immoral interests and even made alliances with the 
disloyal forces of the nation. The evidence proved conclusively that the United States 
Brewers Association and individual brewers financed largely the disloyal and now 
defunct National German-American Alliance. The evidence was so astounding that 
Congress by a unanimous vote took from the Alliance its charter and thus condemned 
it as an enemy in the home camp. 

Following this the custodian of alien enemy property found in the archives of the 
brewers taken over by the government additional damaging evidence. He felt justified 
in making the sensational statement: “That the organized liquor traffic is unpatriotic 
and pro-German in its influence.” He produced the evidence to prove it. This 
evidence has been accumulating ever since. 

This official report of the Government takes away the last alleged right of the 
liquor traffic to an existence. When we realize the hold which this combination had 
on the Nation only a few years ago, it makes us wonder what would have happened if 
the brewers’ power had not been broken before the war began. In all probability it 
would have been strong enough to keep this nation out of the war, and the whole 
current of history and the trend of civilization would have been changed. When 
history is finally written and the forces are all recognized that helped to win this war, 
the Prohibition movement will not be one of the least. 

To think that this powerful influence, with its allies, are overthrown, is a matter 
of congratulation to all patriots. The victory is not an accident. It is the resultant 
of years of persistent, organized effort on the part of the Prohibition forces. There 
were many regiments or divisions in the great army that won the victory. Each had 
an equal part and there is glory enough for all now that the victory is practically won. 
When these forces were united and in action they met the enemy with a zeal equal 
to their enthusiasm and a co-operation equal to their consolidation. Our enemy soon 
realized that when the forces of decency are organized and in action the gates of hell 
and New York City combined cannot prevail against them. 

Legal Objections of Liquor Lawyers Considered. 

The task is not yet completed. The law of evil is that it will spend its last dollar 
to defend its worthless life. This is why all these legal objections are now being 
discovered to drag the fight out into the courts and prolong the agony. The best 
legal claim the liquor interests had against ratification, that the amendment was not 
properly adopted by Congress, has just been decided against them in the United 
States District Court and the United States Supreme Court. Their other contentions 
are technical and will not prevail. They claim that the amendment cannot go into 
effect until there has been a referendum to the people. The Federal Constitution 
provides for no referendum. The liquor interests were against a referendum in every 
unit of government where such a referendum was legal. They only ask for it when 
they know that it would be useless and illegal. They now claim that the time limit 
in the amendment is unconstitutional. This time limit was proposed and urged by 
the opponents of prohibition. When they ask for something and then claim that 
their own request now is unconstitutional it is bad faith. They do not come into 
court with clean hands. The liquor interests cannot be injured by giving the people 
only seven years’ time in which to ratify or in allowing one year after ratification 
before it goes into effect. Even if these limitations were unconstitutional they would 
not affect the other part of the amendment which would be valid. 


SECRET DOMINATION OF THE BREWERIES 


169 


The next proposition which disturbs the liquor interests is the one which gives 
the States and the Federal Government “concurrent” power. Under that power 
Congress will enact a Federal Prohibition law to apply to the whole nation. The 
states will enact State prohibition laws which will be operative throughout the several 
States. Federal officers will enforce the Federal Prohibition Act. State officers will 
enforce the State Prohibition Act. State officers will have as much power at least to 
apprehend the violators of the Federal Act and bind them over to the Federal courts, 
as they now have in the enforcement of existing criminal statutes. Just as the 
municipality and State has concurrent power to enact prohibitory legislation in many 
states and use that power, just so the State and Federal Government may use con¬ 
current power to prohibit the liquor traffic in the nation. It will not bring conflict nor 
disintegration. It will simply result in team work between two units of government in 
the suppression of the beverage liquor traffic. 


A Word to States that Have Not Ratified. 

The Federal amendment has been adopted by more than thirty-six sovereign States. 

The State legislatures that now pass upon this have this additional reason for ratifying 
the amendment. An affirmative vote simply means an indorsement of a policy of Govern¬ 
ment already established. .A negative vote rejecting the amendment will have the 
effect to make it more difficult to enforce the law in the state. It will encourage the 
element that threatens to violate the law. It can serve no good purpose in preventing 
the amendment from being adopted. It can only result in encouraging lawlessness 
within your borders and issuing an invitation to enemies of the prohibition law in States 
which have ratified prohibition, those to come to the non-ratifying States for immunity 
in breaking the law. And not only the would-be law-breakers but the unfortunate re¬ 
formers whose job is about done elsewhere will naturally flock to the non-ratifying 
States. Every reason which influenced the members of the legislatures in the ratifying 
States applies in those States that have not ratified. These reasons and those just 
stated will doubtless be sufficient to influence their people to elect new legislatures to 
ratify the amendment next year or sometime within the six years allowed. There can be 
no good excuse for any State to go on record against the federal policy of government 
already established, and proclaim itself a slacker in this great movement for the 
advancement of civilization. 


Doctors Banishing Alcohol, Welcoming Prohibition. 

In opening the convention of the American Medical Association in New York in 
1917, Dr. C. H. Mayo, the President, said: “No one except the policeman sees more 
of the results of overindulgence in alcohol, demonstrated by pauperism, sickness, im¬ 
morality and crime, than the physician. Medicine has reached a priod when alcohol is 
rarely employed as a drug, being displaced by better remedies. Alcohol's only place 
now is in the arts and sciences. National Prohibition would be welcomed by the 
medical profession.” 


“ Each decade will make clearer the gains of abstinence and will bring to its sup¬ 
port a larger number of thoughtful people. The pressure of economic conditions will 
add to the disadvantage of the drinker and force to the wall with increasing rapidity 
those seeking to relieve their misery by the use of drugs and strong drinks. New and 
better forms of social control are constantly being devised, and those now in use are 
gaining in strength and influence. * * When we all become Americans we will all be 

abstainers.”—Prof. Simon N. Patten, University of Pennsylvania. 




170 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION 


Basic Principles for Enforcement of National 

Prohibition. 

Unanimously adopted by National Legislative Conference representing twenty-two 
national and international organizations devoted wholly or in part 
to promotion of prohibition. 

1. The appointment of Federal law enforcement commissioners with sufficient 
and adequate power and assistants to secure the enforcement of war prohibition from 
July 1, 1919. 

2. A provision for the abatement of liquor nuisances by injunction. 

3. Conferring of power upon the law enforcement commissioner with the ap¬ 
proval of the Commissioner of Internal Revenue to prescribe rules and regulations 
for the manufacture and distribution of wine for sacramental purposes and alcohol 
for non-prohibited purposes. 

4. Conferring of all necessary authority on officers and fixing adequate penalties 
for violation of the act. 

In order to make the National Prohibition Amendment effective the ^ following 
provisions should underlie the draft of the code for its enforcement. 

5. The sale, manufacture, transportation, importation, exportation and possession 
of intoxicating liquor for beverage purposes should be prohibited. 

6. All intoxicating liquors illegally possessed, manufactured, or sold, and all 
implements used in the illegal manufacture of such liquors should be considered con¬ 
traband. 

7. The phrase “ intoxicating liquor ” should include distilled, malt, fermented, 
vinous, alcoholic or any intoxicating liquors. 

8. An adequate search and seizure provision should be added, similar to that 
which has proved effective in the enforcement of prohibitory laws in the states. 

9. The sale of patent or proprietary medicines which are portable or capable 
of being used as a beverage should be surrounded by the same safeguards as the sale 
of alcohol. 

10. Provisions should be made to prevent any scheme, device or subterfuge to 
evade the provisions of the act. 

11. In accordance with the National Amendment, the several states should pro¬ 
vide legislation in harmony therewith to carry out its provisions. 

12. Such other provisions should be enacted as will destroy every vestige of the 
beverage liquor traffic throughout the United States and its possessions. 


Write to Mr. Wayne B. Wheeler, Bliss Bldg., Washington, D. C., for up-to-date information as to 
national and State laws passed or pending that embody these proposals wholly or in part. Earnest efforts 
will be needed to get adequate enforcement laws and faithful enforcement officers. Every State should 
have a workable moral law, such as the Cosson Removal Law of Iowa. 



LIBERTY UNDER LAW 


171 


The Message of the Hour—Americanism as the cure of Bolshivikism. 


“LIBERTY UNDER LAW“ 

Great Utterances on Obedience to Law zuid Law Enforcement 


ABRAHAM LINCOLN: “Let reverence for the laws be breathed by eve^ 
American mother to the lisping babe that prattles on her lap; let it be taught in 
schools, in seminaries, and in colleges, let it be written in primers, spelling books 
and in almanacs; let it be preached from the pulpits, proclaimed in legislative halls 
and enforced in courts of justice, and, in short, let it become the political religion 
of the nation, and let the old and the young, the rich and the poor, the grave and 
the gay, of all sexes and tongues and colors and conditions, sacrifice unceasingly 
upon its altars.” 


Gov. J. M. Patterson, Democrat, of 
Ohio, to Gov. W. T. Cobb, Republican, 
of Maine: 

“ Every patriotic and honest citizen 
must admit that all the laws on the 
statute books of the state should be 
obeyed and enforced; no one citizen has 
more right than any other to select what 
he will obey and what he will not obey. 
If he fails to obey them, he is not a 
good nor a patriotic citizen, and an of¬ 
ficer who has taken an oath to enforce 
the ordinances of a village or a city and 
the laws of the state and fails to do so, 
should at once be removed. The lack 
of respect for law is one of the evils of 
the times, and all people who are patri¬ 
otic and who believe in a stable form of 
government should realize that no form 
of government can exist without law, 
and no republic can continue except on 
the foundation of strict obedience to law 
and a proper administration of justice. 
The dignity of the law must be main¬ 
tained or the republic will decay. Lin¬ 
coln said that “ reverence for law should 
be the religion of the Nation.” This was 
but a strong way of expressing his idea 
upon the subject of law enforcement. 
All Christian people, irrespective of sect 
or creed, should be in favor of law and 
order and should be opposed to law¬ 
lessness.” 


President Benjamin Harrison, in de¬ 
fence of law enforcement by Mayor C. S. 
Denny, of Indianapolis: 

“The idea that a mayor or chief of 
police is at liberty to permit any law or 
ordinance to be violated is monstrous. 
We choose executive officers to enforce 
laws and not to repeal or suspend them 
at their pleasure. It is subversive of our 
system and destructive to our social 
order to allow our executive officers to 
choose what laws they will enforce. It 
is not at all a question whether I like 
the law or whether the officer likes the 
law. What sort of a condition of society 
would we have if no man obeyed the law 
and no officer enforced it unless he liked 


it? Such questions are for the legislature 
and the council. To find fault with an 
officer for enforcing the law is to re¬ 
pudiate our system of government, and 
to vote against a candidate because he is 
pledged to enforce the laws is to asso¬ 
ciate one’s self with lawbreakers.” 


Gov. Jos. W. Folk, who compelled St. 
Louis, St. Joseph and Kansas City to 
obey State Sunday laws and anti-gam¬ 
bling laws (let other Governors do so:) 

“ We hear a good deal about what is 
commonly called the ‘ lid.’ When they 
talk about taking off the ‘ lid ’ on Sunday, 
what do they mean? They mean to let 
the law be broken with impunity. If 
we take the ‘ lid ’ off on the Sunday law, 
can we not with equal propriety take the 
* lid ’ off the larceny statute and the mur¬ 
der statute? Then we would have an¬ 
archy and no government at all. Let me 
tell you the greatest breach of good 
government lies in the fact that laws are 
not enforced. ♦ * * “A dozen ag¬ 

gressively righteous men can bring about 
law and order where lawlessness and dis¬ 
order have prevailed. The business man 
who fears to give his support to any 
movement towards law enforcement lest 
it should injure his business,^ is just as 
much a coward as the soldier on the 
battlefield who turns his back to the 
enemy and flees for safety. 

“ Laws can be enforced in large cities 
and towns as well as any place if the 
officials want them enforced. An official 
can not get around enforcing the laws 
on the ground that public sentiment does 
not support the laws. Public sentiment 
is supporting the law or the law would 
be repealed at the State Legislature.” 


What an Assistant State Attorney Can Do 

From address of Hon. C. W. Trickett, 
1907, published by Phalanx, Indianapolis. 

“ We have tried to make the enforce¬ 
ment of the law in Kansas City, Kas., 
a permanent thing. Five hundred build¬ 
ings in our city are under permanent in¬ 
junction. This year, and next year, and 


This 2 pp. leaflet 26 cents per 100, postpaid, International Reform Bureau. 206 Pennsylvania Ave.. s. e., 
Washineton*^ D. C. The numerous treasonable threats to violate the new^t article of the Constitution 
maki it essential to circulate in shops and public meetings such patriotic appeals as these for loyal 
Obedience to laws made under the orderly processes of democracy. And the lawl^sness common during 
strikes needs also this remedy, together with a League of Compulsory Domestic Jreace by the 

“Middle class” which is neither capitalists nor organized labor, but chief sufferer from their quarrels 
and proper umpire between them. 









172 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION 


a thousand years from now, if any indi¬ 
vidual goes into one of those buildings 
and sells intoxicating liquors any citizen 
can walk into the clerk’s office, sign his 
name to a writ of execution, and the 
sheriff must go down there and abate 
that saloon. Fifteen hundred citizens of 
our town are under injunction never 
again to sell liquor in that county. More 
than 100 of the old saloon keepers are 
under bonds from five hundred dollars 
to one thousand dollars never again to 
sell liquor in our country. More than 
one hundred more are out under sus¬ 
pended sentence, while others are ban¬ 
ished from Kansas.” 


Gov. C. E. Hughes, on Duties of Sheriffs. 

The sheriff of Chemung County, N. Y., 
having failed to perform his duty in the 
matter of enforcing the law concerning 
baseball games on Sunday, the Governor 
was petitioned to remove the sheriff, 
which he was fully empowered to do. 
But the sheriff claimed that he acted 
under the advice of the district attorney 
of his county, and that he could not act 
in the matter of Sunday violation unless 
on a warrant issued on complaint of some 
citizen. The Governor accepted the ex¬ 
cuse of the sheriff, because he acted 
under the advice of a lawyer, but he 
cited the decisions of courts on the ques¬ 
tions involved, and showed that it is not 
the province ot a sheriff to wait until 
complaint is made or a warrant issued. 
Neither should he allow a lawyer to 
stand between him and his duty. The 
Governor made it clear that, while he 
excuses the sheriff in the present in¬ 
stance, the latter need not expect leni¬ 
ency in the future. And what he said 
to the sheriff of Chemunp- County ought 
to be a warning to the sheriffs of other 
counties. 


What Judges Can Do. 

Judge J. C. McWhorter, West Va.: 

“A judge, with an eye single to the 
public weal can, in the discharge of his 
official duties, do much in support of the 
great moral and civic reforms of his 
time. He has a certain oversight of the 
officials under him and can do much to 


compel unwilling officers to ^ do their 
duties. In West Virginia all jurors arc 
selected by two jury commissioners who 
are appointed by the judge and remov¬ 
able at his pleasure. As a general rule, 
juries have heretofore been made up too 
largely of idlers, bums, loungers and 
court hangerson, and generally inferior 
men, who were so sympathetic with 
liquor lawlessness as to require^ more 
evidence to convict a man for illicit sell¬ 
ing than to convict him for murder. This 
has made the enforcement of our liquor 
laws most difficult and ineffective. 
Therefore, when the judge appoints these 
jury commissioners, one from each po¬ 
litical party, let him tell them plainly that 
in the selection of jurors they shall select 
no drinkers or loungers or questionable 
characters, or men who solicit selection, 
but that they shall select only the best, 
busiest, most honorable, moral, sober and 
upright citizens of their counties, and 
that any departure from this rule will 
result in the immediate removal of such 
commissioners from office. By the adop¬ 
tion of this plan I have in my circuit, as 
a general thing, jurors who fearlessly do 
their duty and whom liquor criminals 
most wholesomely dread. Then, again, 
we must remember that ours is a govern¬ 
ment of law, and that no law is effective¬ 
ly enforceable unless backed by a favor¬ 
able public sentiment. The want of this 
Isentiment has always been a woeful 
hindrance to the enforcement of the 
liquor laws. By his charges to grand 
juries, by his talks on all opportune 
occasions, by his very attitude on this 
question, the judge can help to build up 
this sentiment. The judge can, in a very 
proper way, encourage temperance peo¬ 
ple to appear at the trials of liquor cases, 
and by their presence and interest nerve 
the arm of the prosecuting attorney, dis¬ 
courage the sickening perjury of wit¬ 
nesses in such cases, and secure even- 
handed justice and fairness of trials by 
offsetting with their presence the silent 
influence upon court officers, witnesses 
and jurors arising from the invariable 
presence at such trials of the votaries of 
liquor lawlessness and the sympathizers 
with the rum traffic in all of its forms.” 


A CITIZENSHIP OATH. 

We will never bring disgrace to this, our city, by any act of dishonesty, or 
cowardice, nor ever desert our suffering comrades in the ranks. We will fight for 
the ideal and sacred things of the city. We will revere and obey the city’s laws 
and do our best to excite a like respect and reverence in those above us who are 
prone to annul and set them at naught. We will strive unceasingly to quicken 
the public sense of civic duty, and thus in all these ways we will transmit this city, 
not only not less, but greater, better and more beautiful than it was transmitted 
to us. 

The Ephebic Oath taken by the young Athenians 
when assuming the responsibility of citizenship. 




CAN PROHIBITION BE ENFORCED? 


17S 


Can Prohibition be Enforced? 

By Prof. Irving Fisher, Yale University. 

There are many friends of temperance who view with great misgiving the pros¬ 
pect that by next March the prohibition amendment to the national Constitution will 
have been adopted. Some of them are refusing to take any part in the movement for 
ratification, and some, like Mr. Taft, have definitely opposed ratification. Were it not 
for the doubts of these conservatives the belief in prohibition would now be almost 
unanimous. The doubt still lingering is chiefly as to the enforceability of prohibition. 

^ r. Taft’s position is typical of the conservative. He explicitly states that he is 
no friend of alcohol; that he is personally a total abstainer; that he is not in the least 
staggered by the impending losses to those who have financial interests in the liquor 
traffic (for the reason that, for half a century, these people have had ample warning, 
including one from the Supreme Court of the United States, that their investments in 
this predatory business are at their own risk, and that they can expect no compensa¬ 
tion); that he would be glad to see the saloon in politics deposed; that he is in favor 
of local and state-wide prohibition wherever enforceable; and, above all, that he is not 
deluded by the “ individual liberty ” argument. 

As to “ individual liberty ” he says, “ I think that in the interest of the community 
and of the man who cannot resist the temptation to drink in excess, if he has the op¬ 
portunity to drink at all, other citizens in the community may properly be asked and 
compelled to give up drinking, although that drinking may do them no injury.” 

This strong statement will remove the last objection to prohibition in the minds 
of thousands of people, especially as modern science demonstrates that there is no 
drinking ” which does no injury.” The only real issue therefore is as to whether pro¬ 
hibition really prohibits. 

The whole argument of Mr. Taft and of the other few remaining opponents of 
prohibition (outside of those commercially interested in the liquor traffic) revolves 
around this question of enforceability. Assuming the unenforceability of prohibition, 
other objections follow. If prohibition is enforceable only according to local senti¬ 
ment and if it is enforceable in some places and unenforceable in others, it is a local 
rather than a national question, and its introduction into national legislation is an un¬ 
due disturbance of the relations between the national and the local governing bodies. 
Again, if prohibition is unenforceable in one locality, any attempt by the national Gov¬ 
ernment to enforce it will result in corruption, a lowering of the respect for law, a 
perversion of our national politics, and an undue and dangerous power in the hands 
of the executive. 

TO SHOW THAT PROHIBITION IS REALLY ENFORCEABLE WE 
SHOULD CONSIDER TWO THINGS, NAMELY, PAST EXPERIENCE AND 
THE FORCES OUT OF WHICH OUR FUTURE EXPERIENCE MUST COME. 

We have three important facts in past experience which ought to be more gen¬ 
erally appreciated: 

(1) Modern prohibition is already fairly well enforced, far more completely so 
than the public outside of prohibitioil territory have been led, by the misleading pub¬ 
licity of the liquor interests, to realize. The long and favorable experience of Kansas 
is especially noteworthy. Even in Maine prohibition prohibits and has long prohibited 
in the country districts, and has some restraining influence even in the cities, where its 
partial failure has been so widely advertised. 


174 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION 


(3) Evasion of liquor laws is more common where liquor is licensed than where 
it is prohibited. Investigation shows that “ speak-easies ” are actually more numerous 
in “wet” than in “dry” territory. In short, if prohibition is not completely enforce¬ 
able, the other alternative, regulation, is less so. I will add, parenthetically, that the 
recent congressional committee on narcotics finds that morphine and other drug addic¬ 
tion is more common in “wet” than in “dry” territory. 

(3) The public sentiment for prohibition, on which enforcement must always rest, 
has grown prodigiously in the last twenty years. Already about two-thirds of our 
population and three-fourths of our territory is under local or state prohibition. 

With these facts behind us we can readily forecast what is before us if we will 
stop to analyze the forces at work. Most of the few remaining disinterested opponents 
of prohibition would, I think, change their minds if they would make the analysis for 
themselves. It will show that prohibition will be more enforceable in the future than 
it is at present, and that national prohibition will be far more easily enforceable than 
local prohibition. 

Eet us first list the various primary forces which are arrayed against each other. 
By examining them we can best decide which side must win permanently. We find 
six chief forces working for prohibition, namely: (1) Modern Science; (2) Modern 
Industry; (3) The War; (4) Modern Ideals of Health and Efficiency; (5) Moral Senti¬ 
ment; (6) The Organization of these Anti-Alcohol Forces. 

Against prohibition we find: (1) Commercial Interests; (2) Conservatism; (3) 
Alcohol Drug Addiction; (4) The Organization of these Pro-Alcohol Forces. 

First as to modern science. Physiology has found that alcohol is out of place in 
human insides. However we may smack our lips over “ fine wines,” we always dull 
our nerves thereby, just as Alice in Wonderland did no good to her watch by intro¬ 
ducing butter into its insides, although it was the “very best butter”! Most careful 
and delicate tests prove that, even in small quantities, alcohol “ slows down ” our 
nerves. Again, statistical and actuarial science has demonstrated that even steady 
drinking, not more than what is ordinarily called moderate, raises the death rate over 
80 per cent. 

The importance of this new scientific factor cannot be overestimated. It is only 
a question of informing the public generally of what almost every physiologist, physi¬ 
cian, actuary, statistician and economist already knows. Such a solid basis for prohibi¬ 
tion will then exist that npt one per cent of the community will want its repeal any more 
than we now want the repeal of anti-opium laws. 

The hoary ideas that alcohol is useful for the manual worker or the brain worker 
will disappear with the same mathematical certainty that the hoary ideas that the 
earth was flat and that the sun revolved about it disappeared with the progress of 
scientific knowledge. 

Secondly, modern industry has “ no use for alcohol.” Scientific management is 
applying the sciences of physiology, psychology and statistics to increase output just 
as it is applying the sciences of mechanics and chemistry. A Connecticut manufac¬ 
turer says that careful estimates indicate that prohibition would increase his output 
25 per cent. A number of estimates of other producers in this and other countries 
range between 9 per cent and 50 per cent. 

Thirdly, as to the war. Before this war the Kaiser said that next war would 
be won by the armies and navies using the least alcohol. The American Army and 
Navy are using the least alcohol, and they seem to have proved the Kaiser right for 
once! 


WHY NATIONAly CONSTITUTIONAL PROHIBITION? 


175 


Fourthly, as to modern ideals. Unlike the ideals of the past, these are ideals of 
work, not leisure. There was a time when the English “ gentleman ” had to prove his 
gentility, i. e., the fact that he had nothing to do but enjoy himself, by a weekly ca¬ 
rouse. Today these aristocratic ideas of leisure give place to democratic ideas of uni¬ 
versal work. 

After the war these ideas of increasing our power to work in industrial and pro¬ 
fessional life will grow stronger. The war will spread the soldier’s ideal of personal 
fitness in which alcohol has no part. The war will, by its very destruction of life, 
make a new and stronger movement for life conservation, in which alcohol can have 
no part. The war will have destroyed wealth and made a keener industrial compe¬ 
tition, in which alcohol can be allowed to have no part. 

Thus we already see that the first of our six allies now fighting for prohibition 
will only wax stronger with time. 

We turn for a moment to compare the forces on the opposite side of the fight. 

As to the first and most powerful pro-liquor force, that of the commercial inter¬ 
ests involved, it is obvious that this will be entirely destroyed through national pro¬ 
hibition. 

Here at present lies the real strength of liquor. Pro-liquor sentiment exists chiefly 
because it is bought and paid for. There is a vast pro-liquor propaganda, purchased 
and fostered by skilful advertising and the allurements of the saloon. Behind the 
resistance to prohibition, behind even that resistance of the many who have no per¬ 
sonal sympathies with the saloon but are merely misled by false arguments, are the 
liquor interests and their lying or misleading statements. It is their campaign funds, 
corruption funds, able paid attorneys and agents, lobbyists, editors and newspapers 
which influence elections, legislation and law enforcement contrary to natural public 
sentiment. As soon as the liquor interests can no longer supply the sinews of war 
and can no longer use “wet” states as a base of operations for attacking the “dry” 
states, the mainspring of the resistance to prohibition will be broken at last. Pro¬ 
hibition in Maine is successful in the country districts. The chief cause for the fre¬ 
quent partial failure of prohibition in certain city districts in Maine lies not in Maine, 
but in the money power of the liquor interests outside of Maine. 

As to the second factor opposing prohibition, conservatism, this also is extremely 
powerful, but it has no resilience. Its tendency is to keep matters as they are, what¬ 
ever they are. After a generation of prohibition, as in Kansas, drinking becomes “bad 
form,” so that the force of custom, or tradition, so far from threatening a return of 
liquor, changes sides and becomes, instead, one of the strongest safeguards against 
such return. We are all influenced by the customs about us. Contrast the Kansas 
social atmosphere, where any use of alcoholic beverages seems to decent people dis¬ 
graceful, with the social atmosphere in Europe! A student in a certain European uni¬ 
versity was expelled by the faculty a few years ago because he refused to drink the 
toast of the king in wine! 

As to the third factor on the side of liquor, namely, the alcohol drug habit, it also 
will tend to disappear after prohibition. It is true that drug addicts have little scruple 
about breaking anti-drug laws. It is old topers who will have illicit stills in their cel¬ 
lars, and this species of law evasion will not completely disappear until the genera¬ 
tion of topers has died out—an event which will be accelerated by the “toping” itself! 
But, under prohibition, the recruiting of alcohol drug addicts will almost wholly 
cease; for new recruits are now chiefly brought in by the blandishments of hospitality, 
the “ free lunch,” advertising, etc., which will automatically disappear almost wholly 
the instant prohibition is adopted. 


176 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION 


Of the forces thus far mentioned, all the forces for prohibition will grow stronger 
after prohibition; and all those against it, weaker. 

There remain two forces for prohibition and one against it still to be noticed. 

As to the “ moral sentiment,” it also will grow stronger with prohibition. This 
is the experience in Kansas and other prohibition states, and the reason is that, as 
Sumner has shown, morals rest largely on the “mores” or customs of society. The 
rarer and more secretive drinking becomes, the more repugnant it becomes to the moral 
sense of the community. If nearly “ everybody is doing it ” the rest have to condone 
it. I once attended a church conference in Berlin and found beer being served. It 
never even occurred to the German mind that this was unbecoming to the church. On 
the other hand a Yale instructor coming from Kansas had his moral sense greatly 
shocked by seeing saloons in New Haven actually daring to show their signs on the 
public streets! We think nothing of what is common. It is the exceptional which 
excites us. When tuberculosis becomes as rare as smallpox, we shall guard against 
it as much; and when drinking becomes as rare as opium-eating, we shall be as morally 
indignant. 

There still remain two forces, namely, the forces of organization on each side. 
♦ * ♦ It is true that reformers', after securing legislation, often promptly go to sleep 
while the forces of evil, against which they have been fighting, are said never to sleep. 
Many a town and sometimes a state has gone dry and its good citizens failed to keep 
it dry. But this has been because the organization of the liquor forces has been kept 
alive by financial support from outside. 

Just here lies the peculiar merit of national prohibition as distinct from local or 
even state-wide prohibition. The United States Brewers’ Association is a national 
body. This fact, of itself, makes prohibition a national and not a local question; for 
it is only through national prohibition that the great nerve center of this octopus can 
be destroyed. What has thus far been done is simply to amputate some of its ten¬ 
tacles. * * * 

Only national prohibition can and will prevent national mobilization of the liquor 
forces in local battles where the anti-liquor forces cannot be so well mobilized; and 
national prohibition alone can and will destroy the United States Brewers’ Association 
and its ramifications, by cutting off its nutriment. As soon as national prohibition is 
effected, especially if constitutional, the most gigantic and insidious influence in our 
political and social life, our chief “ invisible government ” will be as dead as the Span¬ 
ish Armada and with it will wither much organized political corruption. So far from 
introducing corruption and disrespect for law national prohibition will reduce these 
evils greatly by killing their organization. Resurrection can never occur because it 
would cost too much money and nobody would have a financial interest in furnishing 
the money. The constitutional amendment, once passed, can never be repealed. 
Thirty-six states can never be induced to vote for repeal. The irrevocability of the 
step will show the brewers the hopelessness of further fighting. The liquor question 
will then be settled because the liquor men will be put out of business. It will never 
be settled before. The same principle applies to this warfare as applies to military 
warfare, namely, that permanent peace comes after the surrender of the enemy forces 
and not before. 

Many reason that if local prohibition fails in some localities, national prohibition 
would certainly fail in at least those localities and also in others. But they should 
reason that if local prohibition succeeds in some places national prohibition would 
succeed in those places and also in others. 


CAN PROHIBITION BE ENFORCED? 


177 


It is unsafe to reason by analogy. Many people speak of the difficulties of en¬ 
forceability as though they would be the same under national prohibition as under 
local prohibition. But they will be immensely lessened. National prohibition will 
have introduced an unprecedented condition; for it will have given the coup de grace 
to organized liquor. The liquor forces will collapse like a house of cards. The teach¬ 
ings of modern science will be accepted without further contest, the needs of in¬ 
dustry and labor will be regarded. The ideals of work, efficiency and health as well 
as of moral sentiment will flourish while conservatism will help prohibition as much 
as it now resists it. 

Evasion also will be far more difficult. A brewery is like a city on a hill. It 
cannot be hid. It is too large. In prohibition states there are no breweries though 
there are small hidden saloons dispensing the products of the breweries of wet states. 
Prohibition will eliminate these breweries instantly. Without great breweries any¬ 
where in the United States there can scarcely be many successful saloons, however 
small. 

It will, therefore, be seen that prohibition is really a national, not a local, ques¬ 
tion because the liquor interest is nationally organized and because national prohibi¬ 
tion, for several reasons, can succeed where local prohibition would fail. 

The prohibition movement rests on a solid basis. It is not a mushroom growth 
due to the war and most of the successes of prohibition were achieved before the war. 
Nor is the movement for prohibition today primarily an emotional movement. It rests 
rather on the cold-blooded calculations of the scientist, the statistician, the economist, 
the public health officer, the industrial manager and the military expert. 

To the conservative, who has not followed or understood the prohibition move¬ 
ment and who cannot decipher the handwriting, which he begins, in a dazed way, to 
see on the wall, the movement seems an enigma. To actually wipe liquor off the map 
seems to his unimaginative mind as impracticable as the destruction of the Chinese 
opium traffic seemed a generation ago or as the abolition of slavery seemed before the 
Civil War. 

But these same conservatives will see it all clearly after it has all unfolded. They, 
being by nature law-abiding citizens, will then, themselves, help make law enforce¬ 
ment easy. ♦ ★ * The sentiment for making prohibition prohibit will be universal 

(except among drug addicts), the manufacture of artificial sentiment against it will 
have ceased, and the sound teachings of scientific, industrial and military experts will 
be generally accepted and applied. 


MISS FRANCES E. WILLARD, LL. D., President of World’s Womans’ Chris¬ 
tian Temperance Union, 1889: 

As there is but one keystone to an arch so there is but one to the prohibition 
movement In the nature of the case this must be so, and every temperance expert 
knows that prohibition by amendment to the National Constitution is that keystone to 
the arch, that clincher of the argument, that final outcome of the mightiest reform 
movement under the sun. 

MRS. L. M. N. STEVENS, President of National W. C. T. U., 1911: 

To America, the birthplace of the National and World’s W. C. T. U., we hereby 
proclaim that within a decade prohibition shall be placed in the Constitution of the 
United States and to this end we call the active co-operation of all temperance, religi¬ 
ous and philanthropic bodies, all patriotic, fraternal and civic associations, and all 
Americans who love their country. 



178 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION 


MOST DISTINGUISHED OPPOSER OF NATIONAL PROHIBITION URGES 
LOYAL OBEDIENCE TO THE NEW CONSTITUTIONAL PROHIBITION 

EX-PRESIDENT WM. HOWARD TAFT, Feb. 5, 1919: 

Now the Secretary of State has by proclamation declared _ the adoption of the 
amendment by action of Congress and the approval of the requisite number of State 
legislatures. It is now the duty of every good citizen in the premises, no matter 
what his previous opinion of the wisdom or expediency of the amendment, to urge 
and vote for all reasonable and practical legislature measures by Congress adopted to 
secure the enforcement of the amendment. 

Those who claim that the amendment has not been constitutionally adopted have 
nothing substantial on which to base their claim. The further argument that the 
amendment is void because inconsistent with the fundamental constitutional compact 
as to personal liberty, or reserved power of the States, as, for instance, a change of 
representation of the States in the Senate would be, is “ moonshine.” 

This is a democratic government, and the voice of the people, expressed through 
the machinery provided by the constitution for its expression and by constitutional 
majorities, is supreme. Every loyal citizen must obey. This is the fundamental 
principle of free government. It is this principle which the bolsheviki are fighting 
with wholesale assassination and starvation of their fellow citizens. One who, in the 
matter of national prohibition, holds his personal opinion and his claim of personal 
liberty to be of higher sanction than this overwhelming constitutional expression of 
the people, is a disciple of practical bolshevism. Those who oppose passage of 
practical measures to enforce the amendment, which itself declares the law and gives 
to Congress the power and duty to enforce it, promote the non-enforcement of this 
law and the consequent demoralization of all law. 

This was the evil result opponents of the amendment prophesied, and they are 
thus doing all they can to vindicate their view. Such a course is unpatriotic and 
is not playing the game of self-government fairly. * * * 

The liquor interests and the trades having a profit in the business are now spending 
much in fulminating advertisements, which give false hopes that the doom which has 
been pronounced on liquor manufacture and traffic may be averted. Such efforts 
must be stimulated more by the selfish motives of paid organizers of the liquor interests 
who have funds to expend and who have to justify their employment, than by any 
real hope of defeating prohibition already here. These advertisements are only the 
dying swan-song. They are the last kick of liquor organizations whose own intolerance, 
truculence and corrupting influence in politics have stirred many otherwise conservative 
people to this radical step. * * * 

Forty years ago, and more, all who ventured money in the liquor business were 
advised by the judgments of the Supreme Court of the United States that the guaranty 
of the Constitution that liberty and property could not be taken from any person 
without due process of law did not prevent the legislative -^ower from protecting the 
morals or health of the community from the evils of intoxicating liquors by prohibition 
of the manufacture or sale of liquor, and that without any compensation iot losses 
incident to the ending of the business or of the use of property for the purpose. * * * 

All manufacture of intoxicants on a large scale must and will cease when the law 
takes effect. First, violations will be largely in sales from stocks accumulated against 
“ a rainy day.” These should, of course, be vigorously prosecuted, but attempts to se¬ 
quester and destroy stocks of private persons kept for their own use will strain the 
constitutional power of Congress and will be of doubtful advantage in the long run. 

With Canada dry and the Mexican border remote and the customs examinations 
searching and open manufacture easily preventable, all substantial sources of supply 
will soon be dried up except one. That one is the manufacture of alcohol in some 
form with small, movable and easily concealed devices. The product will be impure 
and deadly in its character and, of course, its making must be suppressed with a 
heavy hand. * * * 

If, after a decade’s trial, the change proves a fail ure and some other remedy for 
the drink evil seems wiser and better, we must count on the American people who 
have no obstinate pride of opinion, to retrace their steps and try again. But meantime 
enforce the amendment, which is the law of the land. 


WHY THE TEMPERANCE MAN SHOULD TAKE A PLEDGE 179 


Why the Temperance Man Should Take a Pledge 

Address by Henry Churchill King, LL. D., President of Oberlin College 

The question that I am asked to answer seems to me to involve two: Why should 
an acknowledged temperate man become a total abstainer? And, why should he be a 
pledged total abstainer? 

From the very beginning, let it be clearly understood that in arguing for total 
abstinence, no attitude of universal condemnation of users of liquor is assumed. My 
own circle of acquaintance includes too many men of undoubted high character who 
use intoxicating liquor to some extent, to make it possible for me to take such an 
attitude of universal condemnation. 

Why a Total Abstainer? 

The first reason for total abstinence seems to me to lie in the real danger of even 
a moderate use of intoxicating liquor. For it must be recognized that “ the action of 
alcohol on the brain is the prime cause of alcoholic consumption.” And this ” action 
of alcohol on the nervous system ” is, as the Outlook says, in its review of this 
report of the Committee of Fifty, ” one of its most important and most unfortunate 
characteristics. It is this action which leads to the ‘craving’ for drink.” This seems 
to me simply to mean that the tendency of the use of alcoholic liquor is almost 
unavoidably toward immoderation. And when one adds, with Dr. Josiah Strong, to 
this natural effect of alcohol upon the nervous system, the consideration of the in¬ 
fluence of our national temperament and climate, he can hardly fail to see that the 
use of alcoholic liquors by Americans is in all probability attended with considerably 
greater danger than their use by many other peoples in other climates. It is this 
direct effect of alcohol on the nervous system which brings about the often plainly 
immoderate use of intoxicating liquors; a use seen to be immoderate not only by 
others but by the man himself. And it is quite as manifest that the use of liquor has 
often become really immoderate in the judgment of a man’s friends when he himself 
would not admit that he had gone beyond the point of strict moderation; for his 
judgment is itself affected by his indulgence. And this latter fact is no doubt one of 
the reasons why such large numbers of men are swept off their feet by the use of 
alcoholic drinks. The plain facts are such as hardly to warrant a man in the judgment 
that he is in no danger from an attempted moderate use of intoxicating liquors. Too 
many men of mental and volitional ability quite equal to his own have been carried 
to utter ruin by the drink habit to justify any one, probably, in thinking the practice 
one without danger to himself. I emphasize this point, because it seems to me that 
we often take the ground that we are abstaining simply for the sake of others, when 
we need really to see and admit the real danger for ourselves, and to abstain simply 
for that reason, if there were no other; not selfishly, but that we may be sure that we 
shall make the best, the very best, of ourselves. Without wishing, therefore, to ex¬ 
aggerate in the slightest degree the facts concerning the danger, I am myself thoroughly 
persuaded that the most rational attitude, in view of the facts, is to say with Paul: 
‘‘All things are lawful, but all things are not expedient; all things are lawful, but I 
will not be brought under the power of any.” 

But even assuming that the moderate drinker might be sure that he would not be 
carried into a condition that meant total ruin for himself, the second reason for total 
abstinence seems to me to lie in the appeal of the physiological facts to the man who 


180 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION 


really wishes to be persistently at his best. .And upon this point I wish simply to quote 
from the Outlook’s summary of the report of the Committee of Fifty. This sum¬ 
mary includes, for example, the following conclusions: (1) “Dr. Abel agrees with the 
majority of observers, that no benefit is derived by people in health from the use of 
alcohol, so far as its effect upon the nervous system is concerned.” (2) And Professor 
Atwater, though he contends, with probable correctness, that in a certain sense alcohol 
is a food, still adds: “If I may be permitted the expression of a personal opinion, it is 
that people in health, and especially young people, act wisely in abstaining from 
alcoholic beverages.” (3) And, again, in summing up the result of the experiments 
upon animals by Dr. Hodge of Clark University, the Outlook says: “The con¬ 
clusions, amply justified, are that the normal resistance to certain germ diseases is 
markedly diminished by alcohol,” (4) “ The experiments also prove the general con¬ 
clusions of hygienists, that in feats of strength and endurance, alcohol should be 
avoided.” (5) And again, “There is no question as to the injurious effect of a con¬ 
tinued use of even small quantities of alcoholic liquors upon children.” (6) Dr. Abel 
himself says: “In all these avocations of life where keen senses, sharp attention, ready 
and immediate use of a clear judgment, or great concentration of the mind, are called 
forth, alcohol in any form or amount is injurious when taking during performance of 
the duty in hand.” 

These conclusions of a report that cannot be regarded as in any way one pre¬ 
judiced in favor of total abstinence, seems to me to contain, nevertheless, a strong 
appeal, as I said, to the man who really wishes to be persistently at his best. They 
seem clearly to indicate that the man in health does not need alcohol, and is in all 
probability decidedly better off without it; and that, if he desires persistently keen 
senses, sharp attention, ready and immediate use of a clear judgment, or great con¬ 
centration of mind, he will, at least when he needs these qualities, abstain from the 
use of alcoholic drinks. And it is for each man to say for himself whether there are 
any times when he can afford deliberately to fall below his best. 

It is in direct line with these conclusions that, in business and industrial life, 
employers are increasingly insisting that men on whom any considerable responsibility 
falls, should practice total abstinence. I cannot believe that the seemingly contrary 
tendency at present seen in social life is soundly grounded. 

The third reason to be urged for total abstinence is, of course its influence upon 
others. For myself, the mere fact that, at a moderate estimate, probably hundreds of 
men are annually carried, by the use of alcoholic liquor, into a condition in which they 
are of small or no value either to themselves or to society, seems to me to be a sufficient 
reason why I should throw the entire influence of my individual practice in favor 
of total abstinence. In no other way can one be certain that he is throwing the full 
weight of his influence against the evil of intemperance. The simple chance that my 
individual or family use of alcoholic liquors might be the occasion of starting another 
man in a custom that would mean absolute ruin to him, seems to me sufficient reason 
for total abstinence. 

And in saying this, I do not forget that there are two classes of weaker brethren, 
and that you may stumble a man by making that a sin for him which is no sin, as well 
as by leading him into some course of action which his conscience condemns. But 
where the issues at stake are so great as they manifestly are in the use of intoxicating 
liquors, and where the gains of the use are so doubtful, I must believe that Paul’s 
principle has real application: “If meat maketh my brother to stumble, I will eat no 
flesh forevermore, that I make not my brother to stumble.” 


181 


WHY THE TEMPERANCE MAN SHOULD TAKE A PLEDGE 

Because, then, of the real danger to the user of alcoholic beverages, because of 
the appeal of the physiological facts to the man who really wishes to be persistently 
at his best, and because of the natural influence on others I adopt for myself, and 
urge upon others, the policy of total abstinence. 


Why a Pledged Total Abstainer? 

To the second question. Why be a pledged total abstainer? I begin my answer once 
more with what seems best for my own highest good. And here, in the first place, 
the dangers seem to me so real and great, the benefits so meager and doubtful, the 
bearings of the question so wide and deep, that I count it better definitely to face and 
decide the question of the use of liquor once for all; and to decide it in the line of 
abstinence. 

Such a pledged attitude, moreover, seems to me to be most in line with the safe 
and sane rational life urged in the following paragraph of James’s Psychology: 

** The great thing, then, in all education, is to make our nervous system our ally 
instead of our enemy. It is to fund and capitalize our acquisitions, and live at ease 
upon the interest of the fund. For this we must make automatic and habitual, as 
early as possible, as many useful actions as we can, and guard against the growing into 
ways that are likely to be disadvantageous to us, as we should guard against tho 
plague. The more of the details of our daily life we can hand over to the effortless 
custody of automatism, the more our higher powers of mind will be set free for their 
own proper work. There is no more miserable human being than one in whom 
nothing is habitual but indecision, and for whom the lighting of every cigar, the 
drinking of every cup, the time of rising and going to* bed every day, and the beginning 
of every bit of work, are subjects of express violition deliberation. Full half the time 
of such a man goes to the deciding, or regretting, of matters which ought to be so 
ingrained in him as practically not to exist for his consciousness at all. .If there be 
such daily duties not yet ingrained in any of my readers, let him begin this very hour 
to set the matter right.” 

I cannot think it wise to leave a question so important and so continually recurrent 
as the use of alcoholic liquor to continual reconsideration. The very attempt at modera¬ 
tion compels one to give far more time and attention to this question than it is worth. 
A policy of abstinence, on the other hand, is clearly safe, and in line with James’a 
principle, leaves the man with the higher powers of his mind just so far set more free 
for their own proper work. In other words, this is a question that it seems entirely 
possible to turn over to habitual action, without any serious loss. Where that is possi¬ 
ble, psychology seems to me to urge the wisdom of such a policy. 

The second reason why a pledged total abstinence seems to me desirable, is because 
a pledge-signing movement is the most natural, and perhaps the only way to make 
definite and decisive the much-needed movement for a personal temperance. The mere 
arousing of sentiment in this direction is not enough. Such sentiment is easily and 
almost certainly dissipated, unless it is crystallized in some definite resolution or action. 
The total abstinence pledge gives just such a needed expression to the aroused temper¬ 
ance sentiment One may well face the question for himself, and ask how else such a 
movement for personal temperance could be made really effective 


182 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION 


Once more, a pledged total abstinence seems to me desirable because it is 
the most positive and definite way in which one’s influence can be made effective for 
others. The man who has pledged himself to total abstinence has thereby put himself 
on record, as far as he possibly can, in favor of such a policy for all men. And the full 
weight of his influence in that direction can hardly be felt in any other way. 

The varieties of pledges, too, seem to me to meet the only serious objections that 
can be made to the pledge-signing movement. Young children are not asked to pledge 
themselves for life, and any one in doubt of the full wisdom of the total abstinence 
policy can take a pledge limited as to time. 

I see no reason, therefore, why the whole burden of the proof does not rest upon 
others than the total abstainer. 


SIGN WITH LINCOLN. THIS PLEDGE HE SIGNED IN YOUTH. 

WHEREAS: The use of alcoholic liquors as a beverage is productive of 
pauperism, degradation and crime: and believing it is our duty to discourage 
that which produces more evil than good, we therefore pledge ourselves to 
abstain from the use of intoxicating liquors as a beverage. 


Have extra copies of pledge printed for every class in Sunday school, for every two 
pews in church, for every row of seats in hall and a pencil ready with each one. 


EDUCATION IN AND OUT OF SCHOOL NEEDED EVERYWHERE 
AGAINST OLD FALLACIES ABOUT ALCOHOL. 

Welfare workers found it desirable in Madras, India, to get the opinions of a 
dozen leading physicians on following points, on which verdict was “No” in 
every case. Will alcohol restore warmth to mother and infant after bath? Will 
it promote growth of children? Does it sharpen one’s mental powers? Does it 
promote appetite and help digestion? Will it healthily remove fatigue? Does it 
produce healthy and refreshing sleep? Will it remove muscular or internal pain? 
Will it prevent or cure malaria, coughs, colds and bronchitis? Does habitual use 
of alcohol have nutritive and strength-building value? In the United States 
another question would be asked by many. Will it cure snake bites? 

Prohibition will suffer from drug stores in the rear, and quack doctors also, so 
long as “ medicinal ” exceptions are necessary because of popular misconceptions. 
In 1885 the writer published in “The Temperance Century” an article by the 
then editor of the Journal of Chemistry saying that educated physicians and 
chemists could provide a substitute for every use of alcohol in medicine and 
the arts, and that such substitution is necessary, with the entire elimination of 
drinkable alcohol, to make prohibition fully effective. 





BEER AND WINE PARS OF WHISKEY 


183 


Beer and Wine Pals of Whiskey. 

entitled “Shall We Save Beer and Wine?” by Scientific Temperance 
Federation, published by International Reform Bureau at $1.00 per 100; 25c per 
dozen, postpaid. Sent free on application with stamp of any country.] 

An age-old fallacy is trying to perpetuate itself in the retention of beer and wine. 
Whiskey and its kindred spirits have been thrown overboard—so far as their manu¬ 
facture is concerned—but beer and its sister wine still clamor for continued existence. 
It has even been asserted in Congress that “ beer is an innocent drink,” that it is 
right and necessary for whiskey to go, but beer and wine—ah! That is another story. 

There is nothing in history or everyday experience or science to confirm these 
beliefs. 

The drunkenness that characterized Rome in her decadent days was wine drunken¬ 
ness. The drunkenness against which Israel’s prophets thundered was wine and beer 
drunkenness. The drunkenness which called out restrictive legislation in early Egypt 
was beer and wine drunkenness. The drunkenness which caused an emperor of 
China centuries ago to order all grape vines uprooted was wine drunkenness. The art 
of distilling spirits was unknown until less than a thousand years ago. The drinks 
which caused the intoxication of which we hear way back in almost prehistoric 
periods were the drinks derived by fermentation from fruits and grains—the wines and 
beers of various kinds. No, history’s evidence fails totally to confirm the belief that 
sobriety lies along the wine and beer route. 

The reason is simple. Wine and beer contain the same alcohol as spirits. The 
proportion is smaller it is true, but the larger amount of beer and wine consumed 
easily averages up the alcohol content. 

Place on the table before you a half pint of light wine containing no more than 
eight per cent of alcohol. Put beside it a pint of four per cent beer—about two glasses 
of beer. Next place a glass containing about three tablespoonfuls of whiskey. The 
three quantities of liquor—a half pint of eight per cent wine, a pint of four per 
cent beer, and three tablespoonfuls of forty-two per cent whiskey—all of them fre¬ 
quently taken by drinkers of the various beverages—contain the same amount of 
alcohol, a little less than two-thirds of an ounce. 

It is true that the more concentrated forms of alcohol produce certain results 
more immediately, but the man who drinks his half pint of wine daily or his two 
glasses or more of beer is just as surely submitting his body and mind to the deleterious 
effects of alcohol as the man who chooses to go down the whiskey slide. It may take 
longer, he may not deteriorate with such conspicuous speed, but injury sooner or later 
makes itself apparent. It is conceivable that a man might take an infinitesimal quantity 
of an alcoholic liquor fairly regularly without its doing demonstrable harm. But that is 
not the way men drink. They do not as a rule even begin with the infinitesimal 
amount, much less hold themselves to it. 

Furthermore the average drinker does not begin with spirits. The drink habit in 
the vast majority of cases begins in the late teens or early twenties. What does your 
young man—or young woman—begin with? Spirits? Rarely. They wander along the 
mildly intoxicating paths of beer or wine until these drinks no longer suffice to produce 
the false pleasure they have learned to seek in the alcoholic poison, and then the jaded 
palate turns to the stronger liquors. 

And it is perhaps partly for this reason that the spirits drinker shows the effects 
more quickly. A constitution already undermined by the alcohol in beer or wine may 
show very marked results more quickly from the concentrated drinks than the person 
who is still in the beer and wine stage, but in either case the alcohol is at work 
producing its deteriorating and life-shortening effects. 


184 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION 


A Fine Sample of Prohibition in Africa. 

[From an article by Dr. Fisch in Contemporary Review.] 

I had the privilege four years ago of taking a journey into the prohibition district 
of the Northern Gold Coast and Togo. This gave me an opportunity to note the 
dijfference between the prohibition and non-prohibition districts. * * * When we 

invited a chief to say to his people that I was a doctor and should be happy if I could 
give advice to the sick or provide them with medicine or free them from their suffering 
by an operation, the reply was usually made that there were no sick among his people. 
This was of course not actually the case, but it struck me that the one or two tu¬ 
berculous persons whom it was my fortune to see, showed quite different forms of that 
ailment from those to which I had been formerly accustomed in the Gold Coast Colony. 

I did not see any carious teeth. And that mothers should suckle their children was 
quite a matter of course and seemed to admit of no exception. Now these people live 
in a land very differently situated from that of the actual Gold Coast. It needs a 
respectable amount of labor to gather from the poor soil in these sun-stricken plains 
the means to support life, quite a different thing from what it is upon the deep soil in 
the primeval forest land of the Gold Coast. There is no valuable export produce to be 
collected as on the rich Gold Coast. Yet they are strong, brawny, enduring people, 
these tribes in the hot and much poorer north. If one looks at the young people of 
Dagbamba, of Konkomba, of Moba, even of low-lying Kasasi and Tsehakosi, one’s 
heart smiles over this fine people, whose carriage, whose build, whose whole appear¬ 
ance give one the impression of a people with enviable reserve of general health and 
power of resistance to disease. 

While in the spirits-drinking Gold Coast in South Togo there are so remarkably 
few old people to be seen, in the north one comes across a considerable number of 
venerable, white-haired negroes. The tribes are friendly and sociable in character, 
unless quite recent occurrences have made them suspicious or have frightened them. 
We see them still, the strong, well-built fellows; how they ran in front of our wheels 
in order to show us the way; how they would stop like lightning to cast aside a stone 
upon which we might have bumped; with what endurance they kept pace with us and 
with what pleasure they entered into the kindly jokes which we ventured to indulge in 
with them; how their faces lighted up when we smiled kindly at them—something so 
entirely different from what we met with away on the Gold Coast where we had so 
often come to see gloomy countenances. 

The shameful slave trade has been succeeded by the no less shameful trade in 
spirits. Which of the two brought the greater injury to the negroes? The slave trade 
has cost life to hundreds of thousands truly enough; it tore families apart and robbed 
men of their freedom; but it has not however, caused degeneracy in their children. 
By alcohol a people is poisoned at its very source and inherits the severest menace to 
its future. 


Relation of Capital and Labor to Prohibition. 

January 17, 1919, the next morning after thirty-six States had ratified the National 
Prohibition Amendment, the Morning Telegraph of New York City, widely known as 
the great sporting paper of this country, and never known as a temperance or prohibi¬ 
tion paper, said editorially: 

“ Unquestionably a majority of the people oppose the manufacture and sale of 
liquors, for it they did not they would not have voted for prohibition. 

“ ‘ Big business ’ has brought about the drought. The captains of industry, railway 
chiefs, steel men, heads of great corporations assert that men who never drink liquor 
work better because of their temperance. These employers of millions waged this pro¬ 
hibition campaign as a matter of business. They financed the ‘dry’ movement, placing 
it generally in the hands of level-headed business men like themselves. Legislatures 
were urged to pass temperanc laws for the good of the communities. Figures were 
offered which the promoters of temperance alleged, showed that men who do not drink 
perform more labor in a given time than their brethren who drink. It was alleged 
that the non-drinkers earned more money and had more money than those who spent 
parts of their income in saloons. The argument must have had weight. The results 
show it. Big business has won a victory. 



CAMPAIGN FOR WORLDWIDE PROHIBITION 


185 


Campaign For Worldwide Prohibition. 

No Separate Peace For Beer and Wine. 

“Why Dry?” is one of a dozen timely books and booklets which the International 
Reform Bureau is sending, free of charge, so far as its funds permit, to the key men 
and women of many lands in promotion of the movement which all reform orgnizations 
endorsed in December, 1918, to celebrate our own nationwide prohibition by immediate 
efforts on a large scale to make prohibition worldwide in 1925. 

For this foreign prohibition work a new edition of “Intoxicating Drinks andDrugs 
in All Times and Lands,” by Dr. and Mrs. W. F. Crafts and Misses Mary and Mar¬ 
garet W. Leitch, is being prepared from fresh testimony as to the present status of the 
use of intoxicants and efforts for their suppression all over the world. 

Prohibition extension will be done in part by sending lecturers abroad—we hope 
only the best, and those that have been approved at both ends of the line, by those 
foreign temperance organizations they are intended to reenforce as well as by some 
union committee in the United States. But this extension of prohibition should also 
be accomplished in large part by subsidizing and reenforcing with money and literature 
established agencies in foreign lands that stand for total abstinence or prohibition, or 
both, including in both cases wine and beer.* Any proposal of “a separate peace for 
beer” should not be aided or abetted by the temperance people of the United States 
who have often seen their great cause hindered and hampered by dilatory motions to 
spare beer and wine. It is as if when three robbers are caught red-handed together, a 
plea should be made to spare two of them bcause their guns were of lower calibre, 
though more than making up by rapid fire. One may get the same amount of alcohol, 
and so of intoxication, in one pint of wine, two pints of beer, or three ounces of whiskey. 
Those who drink the milder drinks usually make up by drinking more at a time. And 
bar rooms usually keep beer, wine, and whiskey. They have been too long associated 
for beer and wine to get away with the idea that they and whiskey are not pals but 
competitors. Beer and wine are most at fault because they introduce the victim to 
whiskey. In the United States at least, practically none reach the inebriate asylums who 
do not confess that it was beer or wine that led them to whiskey and the degradation of 
the drunkard. And it is time every intelligent man should recognize that the chief 
evils which come from the drink traffic are not the drunks, but lowered efficiency and 
corruption of democracy. 

We strongly advise that the new book of Charles Stelzle “Why Prohibition?” 
published by George H. Doran, New York City, shall be sent through some benevolent 
fund to libraries all over the world. It covers the whole subject in up-to-date fashion 
and racy, readable style, but gives particular attention to the relation of drink to the 
financial interests of employer and employees in the great industries. 

We shall appreciate swift co-operation in circulation of “ Why Dry? ” also and sug¬ 
gestions for future editions. (See p. 148 for short list of other books recommended for 
the worldwide prohibition campaign.) 


•The followinsr are some of the established temperance agencies that the International Reform Bureau 
has subsidized in a small way and recommends to others for larger subsidies: International Temperance 
Bureau, Lausanne. Switzerland; International Grand Lodge of Good Templars, Stockholm Sweden; 
Dr. Paul-Maurice Legrain, Good Templars, Paris; Committee of Cooperation in Latin America, 25 Madison, 
St, New York City; World’s Sunday School Association, Metropolitan Tower, New York City; National 
W. C. T. U., Lvanston, Ill.; Temperance Alliance of Scotland, Glasgow; British Temperance Alliance, 
Manchester, England; The International Reform Bureau has a bran^ in Pekin, China, which has led 
to victory the anti-opium fight, and will now defend China against invasion by American brewers, in which 
defense unlimited subsidies could be used to advantage. 




186 


BRIEFS FOR PROHIBITION 


Prophetic Calls to Worldwide Prohibition Crusade 

SENATOR H. W. BLAIR, in first favorable report in Congress on National 
Prohibition, 1888: 

The agitation for the destruction of the liquor traffic cannot cease until the evils 
which it inflicts on mankind are removed, or the human race is destroyed. 

HON. JOSEPHUS DANIELS, Secretary of the Navy, in letter to W. F. Crafts, 
1919: 

I hope we will soon see worldwide prohibition. 

SENATOR MORRIS SHEPPARD, in letter to same, 1918: 

Worldwide prohibition should go with worldwide democracy, making the latter 
safe and strong and pure. 

U. s. SENATOR WESLEY L. JONES, in letter to same. 1919: 

The joy that is brought to the homes of the United States by National Prohibition 
I hope to see brought to the homes of every people by worldwide prohibition. 

U. S. REPRESENTATIVE ALBEN W. BARKLEY in letter to same, 1919: 

The evils of liquor are not limited by national bounderies, I hope America’s ex¬ 
perience and example will hasten the abolition of the traffic throughout the world. 

U. S. REPRESENTATIVE EDWIN Y. WEBB, in letter to same, 1919: 

Prohibition and temper’ance are as essential to the moral and social welfare of the 
peoples of the earth as democracy is essential to them politically. Prohibition and 
temperance are good for the highest and lowest, the richest and poorest of the peoples 
of the earth, wherever they are found, and I predict that a prohibition earth is just as 
inevitable as a democratic earth. 

U. S. REPRESENTATIVE HORACE M. TOWNER, in letter to same, 1919: 

The United States will rejoice to have the nations of Europe associated with her in 
an endeavor to rid the world of the evils of intemperance. 

H. B. ISHII, Japanese Ambassador to the United States, 1918: 

Alcohol is an ever-present menace until it is finally done away with the world over. 

DEAN OF ST. PAUL’S, London, 1914: 

The most inspiring faith of our day is the confident belief that purposive effort, 
guided by expert knowledge, may achieve great things for the human race. 


ALPHABETICAL INDEX 


187 


Alphabetical, Analytical, Cyclopedic Index. 

This is more than an index of this book; it aims to be an index of the whole subject 
so far as new conditions at home and abroad require for practical purposes. It is also 
in some sense a syllabus, aiming to show by the indexing terms just what is “ shown ” 
by this book and other sources of information named—societies. Government bureaus, 
specialists, etc. The two most recent books covering the whole subject of temperance 
are: The World Book of Temperance by Dr. and Mrs. Wilbur F. Crafts, and the 
Pocket Cyclopedia of Temperance by Mr. Deets Pickett. These two books with 
latest Year Book of Anti-Saloon League and this “Why Dry?” will make a sufficient 
equipment for practical campaigning. Other three books sent by publisher of this 
book for $2, postpaid, to any land. 


Absinthe, worst of distilled liquors, for¬ 
bidden in France, 53; also in Switzer¬ 
land, 153. 

Abstinence, required by Hindu, Buddhist 
and Mohammedan religions, 115; also 
by Christian religion, 155; arguments 
for, (1) on hygienic grounds, 115, 116, 
117, 119, 122, 123, 154. (2) on athletic 

grounds, 115. (3) on economic 

grounds, 116, 117, 119, 120. See Effici¬ 
ency. (4) on social grounds, 116, 120, 
179, 180. See Home. (5) on patriotic 
grounds, 121. See Brewers. See 
Pledge, also Prohibition, many argu¬ 
ments for which also support absti¬ 
nence, although abstinence is not usu¬ 
ally required in prohibition laws, 139— 
it is required in new American “ bone 
dry ” laws, which make no exceptions 
for “ personal use,” 3, 5, 68, 84. Strong 
book on, Vance Thompson’s “ Drink 
and Be Sober,” 137. 

Africa, liquor status of, 160: exports of 
liquors to, 56, 115, 131; prohibition in, 
184. 

Alberta, 147. 

Alabama, 149, 153. 

Alaska, 152. 

Alcohol, the liquid excrement of a mi¬ 
crobe, 117, 123, 140. 

Allies, list of, 19. 

Amendment, prohibition, to U. S. Con¬ 
stitution, wording of, 3; history of, 7, 
8, 68, 177; arguments for submission, 
inside first cover; arguments for 
amendment, 3, 161, 167; attempts to 
nullify, 169. 

Anarchy of liquor traffic, see Liquor 
dealers. 

Anderson, Wm. H., quoted, 144. 

Anti-Saloon League, planning foreign 
prohibition work, 154, 183. 

Arabia, a leader in prohibition, 65. 

Arizona, 80, 149, 153. 

Arkansas, 80, 149, 153. 

Armies, iniured by drink, and vices to 
which it leads, 20, 22, 47, 48, inside last 
cover. 


Arrests, under “wet” and “dry” regimes, 
75-78, 88, 111. 

Asia, 65, 135, 157. 

Athletes, abstinence of 31 (footnote), 53, 
115. 

Australasia, 135, 158; speech delivered 
in, 138. 

Austria-Hungary, reduction of liquors 
by, in War, 51, 134. 

Banks, savings, deposits of increased by 
prohibition, 52. See whiskey securi¬ 
ties. 

Barkley, Representative Aben W., quot¬ 
ed, 184. 

Bar rooms described, 115’ speech on, 138. 

Beer, hygienic injury wrought by, 123-6; 
and wine do same sort of harm as 
whiskey and require same treatment, 
21 (footnote), 81, 93, 130. See Brew¬ 
ers, Saloons, Liquor traffic, etc. 

Belgium, 23, 158. 

Bevan, Dr. A. D., quoted as for war 
prohibition, 23. 

Bible passages quoted in support of pro¬ 
hibition, 65, 66, 115. 

Biddle, Gen., order permitting soldiers 
to accept gifts of liquors, 48. 

Blair, Ex-Senator Henry W., quoted, in¬ 
side first cover (portrait), 64, 130. 

“Blind pigs,” not so bad as licensed ones, 
144. 

Bolshevikism, in Russia, not due to pro¬ 
hibition, 52, nor likely to result from 
it anywhere, 55, 57. See Liquor law¬ 
lessness. 

“Bone dry” prohibition (signifies prohi¬ 
bition with no exceptions for “personal 
use,”) origin of, 68; significance of, 82, 
84, 99; 154; first national amendment 
on that basis, inside first cover. 

Books on prohibition, 127, 128, 148, 155, 
183. 

“Booze,” very old name for drinking in¬ 
toxicants, used in 1777 in Sheridan’s 
“School of Scandal,” centuries before 
distiller Booze of Phila. lived. 


188 


ALPHABETICAL INDEX 


^‘Bootleggers/’ (unlicensed secret ped¬ 
dlers of forbidden drinks, small busi¬ 
ness of, 5. See Speakeasies. 

Boycot, not legitimate weapon in demo¬ 
cracy, 13; of business men by brewers, 
12 . 

Brewers, no better than saloonkeepers, 
95-6; backers of German-American Al¬ 
liance, 9; admissions of lawlessness by, 
41; political intrigues exposed, 1; U. S. 

'Senate investigation of, 45, 164, 165, 
166, 167-169; moving business to other 
lands, 136, 157; domination of politics 
by, 12, 126, 131. See also liquor traffic. 

Breweries and distilleries readily con¬ 
verted to better uses, 37. 

Bribery, defined by British Court, 12; by 
liquor dealers indirectly admitted, 7. 

British, see Great Britain. 

British Columbia, status of, 147 . 

Bryan, Hon. Wm. J., quoted, 105. 

Brothels, see Prostitution. 

Buddhism, a total abstinence religion, 
15, 56, 58, 65, 135, 157. 

Bulgaria, 51, 121. 

Business benefitted by prohibition, 116. 
See Prohibition-economic. 

California, 42, 149. 

Canada, 140, 145-148, 158; offended by 
British war “canteens” that sold liquors 
to Canadian soldiers, 54. 

Canal Zone, 152, 155 (Prohibition made 
permanent Feb. 25, 1919). 

Cannon, Bishop James, Jr., Investigation 
of moral conditions by, in Great Brit¬ 
ain and France in War, 41, 47, 48, 53. 

Capital and Labor, both benefitted by 
prohibition, 3. 

Catholic testimonies against saloons, 
102-104, 107, 115. 

Charleston, S. C., benefits of prohibition, 
77. 

Chicago, procession in support of law¬ 
lessness in, 162. 

Childhood, injured by drinking of par¬ 
ents, 85, 86. 

China, Anti-opium victory of 58; anti- 
alcohol fight proposed, 129, 130, 157. 

Church, Temperance Boards, 154. 

Churches, their mission in the war, 48-50. 

Citizenship, oath of, 172. 

Clark, Speaker Champ, ouoted, 106. 

Coal, See Fuel. 

Colby, Bainbridge, answered, 31. 

Colorado, Status of, 36, 40, 74, 80, 149, 
153. 

Commandments, how related to drink, 
138. 

Compensation, proposed for liquor deal¬ 
ers, 44, 45. (Compensation is fixed by 
law in Great Britain by Balfour Act, 
and is proposed in New Zealand in 
1919 election.) Apply with stamp for 


strongest argument against compensa¬ 
tion to Rev. Clarence True Wilson, 
204 Pa. Ave., s. c., Washington, D. C. 

Compromises perilous, 139. 

“Concurrent jursdiction” of federal and 
State governments, 8. 

Congo, 160. 

Congress, Temperance work in and 
about, 154. 

Conservation, through -prohibition, of 
food, 24-31, 41-43, first and last cover; 
fuel, 24-29; transportation, 29; money, 
43-45; man - power, 20-24, 31-44; 

“Morale,” 45-50; resources in general, 
3. 

Constitution, prohibition amendment of, 
see Amendment, Ratification. 

Constitutionality, of State prohibition, 
122; of war prohibition, 28, 29; of 
national amendment, 153, 161, 167. 

Consumption of liquors per capita, in 
nation at large, 5; in dry areas, 5: in 
other lands, 158. 

Corrupt practices act, amendment sug¬ 
gested, 13. 

Cost of drinks, in nation at large, 43. 

Crafts, Wilbur F., estimate of by John G. 
Wooley, 3; books by, 127, 128; temper¬ 
ance work of, 154. 

Czecko-Slovaks, 156; speech of Presi¬ 
dent of, 134. 

Daniels, Secretary Josephus, quoted for 
war prohibition, 17, 19, 33, 34; for 
worldwide prohibition, 184; on liquor 
dealers disregard of law, 20. 

Delaware, 149. 

Democracy everywhere requires prohibi¬ 
tion to safeguard it against such liquor 
domination as Senate investigation has 
uncovered, 1, 164, 165, 167, 184. 

Denver, how benefitted by prohibition, 74. 

Detroit, how benefitted by prohibition, 
34, 35, 75. 

Distilled liquors put under separate re¬ 
strictions, 156. 

District of Columbia, 152. 

Drunkenness, no longer central word In 
temperance discussion, but efficiency, 
120, 129, 135. (See Efficiency); from 
wine, 137. 

East St. Louis riot, 6. 

Efficiency, reduced by drinking, of sol¬ 
diers, 19-22, 51, 82; of munition work¬ 
ers, 23; of coal miners, 24; of trans¬ 
portation workers, 29; of ship builders, 
31; of industrial workers generally, 29, 
30, 51; of mind workers, 81, 82, 117, 
135; reduced even by moderate drink¬ 
ing, 81, 82, 119, 129, 134, 135, 155; 
estimates of percenta<^e of efficiency 
lost by drink, added by prohibition, 24, 
28, 30, 31, 36, 52, 174. 


ALPHABETICAL INDEX 


189 


Eliot, Ex-Pres. Chas- W. Eliot quoted 
118. 

Employment, low ratio of employees to 
capital in liquor business contrasted 
with larger percentage of turn over 
going to labor in other trades, 37; 
finding of, for workers in liquor busi¬ 
ness not difficult, 37. 

Endeavor Society, 154. 

Enforcement, early State prohibitions 
lost for lack of, 68; union plan of, for 
war prohibition and amendment, 170; 
great utterances in support of 171-177; 
opposers of warned, 144. “Wet” ex¬ 
ecutives often elected in U. S. to 
administer “dry” laws, 4. 

Europe, 135, 156; prominence of uni¬ 
versity professors and medical experts 
of, in leadership of abstinence move¬ 
ment, 58; arguments for prohibition in 
new democracies of, 131. 

Extension of prohibition to foreign 
lands, 51, 129-159. 

Farmers, declaration of, for wartime pro¬ 
hibition, 23. 

Fiji Islands, 159. 

Finland, first prohibition law of, vetoed 
by Czar on demand of French wine and 
brandy interest, 132. 

Fisher, Prof. Irving, cited, 41, 154; ad¬ 
dress by, 173-177. 

Florida, 4, 20, 112, 149, 153. 

Flying Squadron, 154. 

Folk, Ex-Gov. Jos. E., quoted, 105, 171. 

Foods, wasted in making liquors. See 
Conservation. 

Foreign immigrants, two kinds of, 16; 
accept prohibition calmly and get to 
like it, 36, 87. 

France, official anti-alcohol posters of, 
58, 122; war prohibition advocated by 
leaders of, 24, 53, 62-64; domination of 
governmnet of, by liquor interested, 
131; American barley shipped to, for 
makinp" beer in wartime, 56; centenar¬ 
ians per 1,000 in, 121. 

Fraternities of first rank bar out liquor 
dealers, 108, 118, 143. 

French, Sir John, quoted, 21. 

Fuel wasted in making and selling drink. 
See Conservation. 

George, Rt. Hon. Lloyd, declared for 
war prohibition, 23, 24; did not pro¬ 
hibit but restricted sale in wartime to 
five hours per day with no treating. 
Removed these restrictions after armi¬ 
stice was signed. See Great Britain. 

Georgia, 4, 31, 77, 139, 149, 153. 

Germans in U. S., many of, loyal to 
American ideals, 16, 65, 169; others, 
especially brewers, disloyal, 1, 49; also 
German-American Alliance, 9, 11, 13, 
28. See Brewers. 


Germany, Kaiser William of, quoted in 
behalf of abstinence, 49, 57; centenar¬ 
ians in, before the War, lowest of any 

country, 121; why solders and citizens 
so barbarous, 133: brewing reduced in, 
during war, 23, 51; consumption and 
cost of drink in, 134, 158. 

Gibbons, Cardinal, not representative of 
Catholic Church in opposing prohibi¬ 
tion, 38, 104. 

Gladstone, quoted, 138. 

Gompers, Samuel, activities of, in behalf 
of liquor interests, 11, 37, 38. 

Gordon, Ernest, books of, 148. 

Gothenberg System, breakdown of, 
shown in book of that name by Ernest 
Gordon, published by International 
Reform Bureau, 50 cents postpaid. Sec 
also Government ownership. State 
Purchase, Disinterested Management, 
all wrong in principle and economically 
and politically unsound. 

Government ownership of drink traffic, 
66, 144. See Gothenberg System. 

Grain, shipped in wartime to make 
drink abroad, 56; wasted in making 
drink, see Conservation. 

Great Britain, worthy acts of recalled, 
56, 58; percentage of centenarians in, 
121; early blunders of, in liquor re¬ 
striction (in common with U. S.), 66; 
moral conditions in, during war, 54; 
found drink promoter of venerial dis¬ 
eases, 130; efforts of leading people 
for war prohibition in, 54; domination 
of politics of, by liquor interests, 131; 
action of Government in liquor re¬ 
strictions, 23, 24; present status, in¬ 
cluding “State Purchase” proposal, 56, 
156; wrongs of, to native races in pro¬ 
moting drink traffic in British colonies, 
continuance of which would be incon¬ 
sistent with Peace Conference princi¬ 
ples for colonies, 55, 56, 131, 135; rela¬ 
tive consumption of liquors in, 158. 

Greenland, under prohibition. 

Guam, 153. 

Harrison, Ex-Pres. Benjamin, quoted, 
171. 

Hart, Gen. Sir Reginald, quoted, 21, 

Hawaii, 153. 

Hinduism, a total abstinence religion, 
56, 58, 65, 115, 135, 157. 

History of temperance movement, 65, 70, 
118; references to by years: 1839, 93; 
1842, 18; 1851, 68; 84; 1856, 68; 1870, 68; 
1876, 1886, inside first cover; 1888, 
same and 110; 1889, same and 177; 1903, 
7, 1906, 4; 1907, 4, 68; 1911, 4, 5, 177; 
1914, 8, 9, 68; 1917, 11, 68, 84, 99; 1918, 
6, 9, 12, 13. 

Hobson-Sheppard amendment, vote on, 8. 


190 


ALPHABETICAL INDEX 


Homes harmed by drink, benefitted by 
prohibition, 36, 67, 70, 84-87, 114, 120, 
138, 142. 

Hotels changing from “wet” to “dry,” 85. 

House of Representatives, vote of on 
Hobson prohibition amendment, 8; 
vote on “bone dry” amendment in Dec., 
1917j is erroneously stated on p. 7. It 
was 26 more than two-thirds, 282 to 
128. 

Howard, Clinton N., quoted, 143. 

Hughes, Ex-Gov. Chas. E., quoted, 172. 

Humes, E. Lowry, quoted, 10, 11, 13. 

Hurley, E. N., answered, 31. 

Iceland, under prohibition, 135. 

Idaho, status of, 80, 150, 153. 

Illinois, 11, 150. 

Immigrants, accept prohibition, 57. 

India, a leader in abstinence and prohi¬ 
bition anciently, 65; total abstinence 
religions of, strong reasons why Great 
Britain should restore prohibition, 56; 
seriously wronged by British opium 
and liquor traffic, continuance of which 
would be inconsistent with new code 
for colonies of Peace Conference, 131, 
157. See Hinduism, Buddhism, Mo¬ 
hammedanism. 

Indiana, 150. 

Indians, liquor selling to, forbidden^ in 
some Latin Americas, 155; prohibition 
in former Indian Territory by U. S., 
160. 

Inebriate asylums, study of, 137. In 
European temperance work inebriate 
asylums are much considered, but the 
United States has little use for them. 
Prohibition seems to make them most¬ 
ly unnecessary. 

Insurance statistics favor abstinence, 
116, 119, 124, 136. 

Intercollegiate Prohibition Association, 
154. 

International Reform Bureau, author of 
war prohibition bill, 50; work of, 154, 
183. 

International, world wide prohibition, 
183, 184. 

Interstate Commerce difficulties in earlier 
prohibition legislation, 4. 

Iowa, 80, 150, 153. 

Iron mills hampered by drinking of em¬ 
ployees, 29-31. See Efficiency. 

Italy, why should adopt prohibition, 57. 

Japan, prohibition army of, 58. 

Jefferson, quoted, 141. 

Jones, Senator Wesley L., quoted, 17; 
cited, 154. 

Kansas, 18, 80, 150, 153. 

Kentucky, 7, 113, 150. 

King, Pres- Henry Churchill, speech of, 
179-182. 


Labor, leaders of, objects of brewers 
special care, 11; petition in opposition 
to national prohibition said to repre¬ 
sent organized labor shown to repre¬ 
sent only one-fiftieth of unions and 
only 22 then “wet” States—that is la¬ 
bor unions that had not seen prohibi¬ 
tion tried, 39; petitions and expressions 
from labor leaders'in States where pro¬ 
hibition has been tried favorable, 37, 39, 
40, 70, 72; 27 plebiscites representing, 
in Great Britain strongly for war pro¬ 
hibition; patriotic grounds for labor co¬ 
operation in prohibition, 23-50, 156. 

Law and liberty, 15. 

Law enforcement, see Enforcement. 

Lawlessness, of liquor traffic has been 
one of chief factors in hastening its 
overthrow, 3, 6, 8. See Liquor traffic. 

Latin America, 155; prohibition argu¬ 
ment for, 135. 

Legislators, vote of, on ratification, 153; 
bound to act on their own judgment, 
not on dictation of constituents, 13. 

Legislatures corrupted by liquor traffic 
7, 10. See States, Politics. Liberty 
under law, 15. 

License, sin and follyof license laws, 
66, 67, 109, 142, 144; keeps drink near 
and respectable and so increases drink¬ 
ing, 88; restrictions of, ineffective, 139; 
unconstitutional, 122. 

Lincoln, quoted, 141, 171. 

Liquor traffic, lawlessness of, 3, 11, 13, 
14, 25, 118, 129, 132, 133, 162; shown in 
violations of license laws as much as 
of prohibition laws, 6; admitted by 
their own organs and leaders, 5, 7, 13, 
20, 92-98; domination of politics by 
3, 9, 10, 129, 131, 132, 133, 138, 156, 157, 
165, 167; was mostly pro-German in 
great war, 1, 9; use of money to con¬ 
trol legislation, 7, 9, 10. 

Local option (same as “local veto”), 4, 
88-112. See Prohibition. 

Louisiana, 7, 150- 

Maine, 4, 5, 68, 80, 150, 153. 

Manitoba, 146. 

Maryland, 7, 150. 

Massachusetts, 7, 111, 150. 

Mayo, Dr. C. H., quoted, 169. 

Mayors, “wet” in many “dry” cities, 4. 

Medical authorities quoted, 23, 47, 63, 
140, 154, 169. See prohibition, hygienic. 

Mexico, 135, 155. 

Michigan, 7, 31, 34, 35, 75, 150, 153. 

Minnesota, 111, 150. 

Mississippi, 31, 150, 153. 

Missouri, 151. 

Mohammedanism, an abstinence religion, 
56, 58, 65, 115, 135, 157. 

Mondays, benefits of Sunday closing 
seen, 35. 


ALPHABETICAL INDEX 


191 


Montana, 151, 153. 

Munition workers, more efficient under 
prohibition 23. See Efficiency. 

National prohibition, early declarations 
for, inside first cover, 177; first amend¬ 
ment reported, 1888, inside first cover, 
form of adopted amendment, 3; argu¬ 
ments for, with answers to objections 
to, 3-18, 161-169; ratifications of, by 
States, 149-152; threats of labor revolt 
because of, 36, 57, 144. See Prohibi¬ 
tion. 

Navy, efficiency of increased by prohibi¬ 
tion, 33, 34. See Daniels. 

Nebraska, 73, 151, 153. 

Negro, relation of, to liquor problems in 
Southern States, 4; race riots against, 
in East St. Louis, 6; brewers plots to 
control, 10, 11. 

Nevada, 151. 

New Brunswick (Canada), 146. 

New Hampshire, 36, 151, 153. 

New Hebrides, 159. 

New Jersey, 68, 151. 

New Mexico, 151 153. 

Newport, R. I., 33. 

New York, 8, 151. 

New Zealand, 158. 

“No beer, no work” cry, 144. 

North Carolina, 31, 80, 151, 153. 

North Dakota, 68, 76, 80, 151, 153. 

Nova Scotia, 145, 141. 

Oceanica, 159. 

Ohio, 11,151. 

Oklahoma, 151, 153. 

Omaha, 74. 

Ontario, 146. 

Opium and Morphia in Asia, 56. 

Oregon, 151, 153. 

O’Ryan, Gen. John F., quoted, 21. 

Palmer, Hon. A. Mitchell, quoted, 1, 165. 

Parties, political, both too much influ¬ 
enced in past by liquor traffic, 6. 

Peace Congress, doctrine that colonies 
must be governed for their own wel¬ 
fare chiefly, rules out drink traffic, 157, 
159, 160. 

Pennsylvania, 9, 11, 151. 

Pershine, Gen. Jack, concessions on 
wine and beer for soldiers 48, 53. 

“Personal liberty” cry fallacious, 15, 41. 

“Personal use,” formerly allowed in U. 
S., 5; forbidden under “bone dry” laws, 
82 

Peru, 155. 

Petitions, for national prohimition, in¬ 
side first cover; sacred right of at¬ 
tacked by brewer’s threats, 12. 

Philippines, 153. 

Pledges 115, 143, 179-182. 

Police powers of States protected by 
national prohibition, inside first cover. 

Politics, dominated and corrupted by 
liquor traffic, 6, 24. 


Porto Rico, 135, 153, 155. 

Posters on alcoholism, French and 
British, 121. 

Press, liquor press, admissions of, 5, 7; 
corruption of daily, by liquor interests, 
165, 167. 

Prince Edwards Island, 145. 

Prostitution, promoted by use of intoxi¬ 
cants, 6, 7, 47, 134. 

Prohibition countries: Canada, Faroe 
Islands, Greenland, Guatamala, Hedjaz, 
Iceland, Togo, United States. 

Prohibition, history of, inside first cover, 
5, 8, 65-70, 154, 157; (see histories of 
temperance movement by Fehlandt and 
by Johnson and Wooley; also “Chronl- 
ogy” in Crafts’ “World Book of Tem¬ 
perance”); purpose of, 67, 68, 139; 
benefits of, in U. S. see under each 
State, etc.; in Canada, 145-148; in Rus¬ 
sia, 52, 132, 135; in Sweden, 59; forms 
of: local, 88-112, 4, 69, 130, 139, 156; 
State statutory, 68, 69; State constitu¬ 
tional, 65, 68; national war, 1, 19-50, 
20, 51, 52; national constitutional, in¬ 
side first cover, 3-18, 161-169; national 
in other lands, see Sweden and Russia 
above; “bone dry” (no exception for 
“personal use”), 5, 68, 82. 

Prohibition, world, proposed, 51-64, 184, 
185, 186. Arguments for, in general, 3, 
68-70; hygienic, 83-84, 117, 122, 131, 133, 
134; economic and industrial, 3, 23-45, 
57,64,67, 70-72, 87, 116, 121, 123-126, 131, 
135; social, including “home protec¬ 
tion,” 36, 67, 70, 84-87, 114, 133; pa¬ 
triotic (with emphasis on peril to 
democracy of liquor domination), 1, 3, 
13, 45, 67, 129, 131, 132, 134, 136, 138, 
156; see Arrests, Enforcement. 

“Prohibition don’t prohibit,” an implied 
threat to violate law, 139. 

Prohibition Party, 154. 

“Prohibition zones,” about munition 
plants and mines, 22. 

Quebec, Province of, 146. 

Railroads, require abstinence, 129, 136, 
143; conservation of transportation on, 
by prohibition, 29. 

Randall, Hon. C. H. P., quoted, 184. 

Ratification of national prohibition 
amendment, statistics of, 153; objec¬ 
tions to, answered, 7, 153, 167; signi¬ 
ficance of, after 36 States ratified, 169. 

“Red Light” districts closely allied to 
liquor traffic, 6, 7. 

Reduction of shops ineffective, 158, 

Reed “bone dry” prohibition, 5. 

Relief funds as related to drink waste, 
41, 133. 

Revenue from liquors, offsets restrictive 
provisions, 66; but a small fraction re¬ 
bated from what liquor traffic costs 
the people, 44; offset and much more 


192 


ALPHABETICAI^ INDEX 


by improved conditions under prohibi¬ 
tion, 3. 

Rhode Island, 151. 

Richmond, Va., 79. 

Riots promoted by bar rooms, 6; rather 
than by closing them, 40, 41. 

Roosevelt, Ex-Pres. Theodore, quoted, 
105, 141 (portrait). 

Rumania, 53. 

Russia, benefits of national prohibition 
in, 52, 132, 135. 

Saloons (American name for bar rooms 
and what British call “public houses”). 
115; described by liquor papers, 93-96; 
by labor leaders, 100-102; by Catholic 
bishops 102-104; by protestant con¬ 
servative leaders, 104; by public offi¬ 
cials, 105; seen on background of war, 
107; keepers of, excluded by first class 
fraternities, 108. 

Saskatchewan, 146. 

Savannah Ga. 77. 

Scandanavia 156. 

Scotland, 156. 

Securities, whiskey, 42, 43. 

Senate, U. S., brewers efforts to control 
elections to, 11; action on war prohibi¬ 
tion, 13. 

Sheppard, Senator Morris, quoted, 184; 
cited, 154; prohibition amendment of, 3. 

Ship building speeded up by prohibition, 
31-34. 

Soldiers, efficiency of, lowered by drink, 
19-22, 23, 28, 47, 48, especially that of 
officers, 20; led to prostitutes by drink, 
47 48; sale of liquors to forbidden by 
Congress, 18, 21 (footnote); quota¬ 
tions from great commanders against 
drinking by, 20; permitted to drink by 
Gens. Pershing and Biddle, 48, 53. 

South Africa, 160. 

South America, 135. 

South Carolina, 77, 78, 139, 151, 153. 

South Dakota, 152, 153. 

Southern States, 4. 

Spain, 135, 121. 

“Speak-easies,” (places where liquors are 
illegally sold), small business at the 
worst, 5; in wet and dry compared, 72. 

States, under prohibition and order of 
adoption, 153; testimony of governors 
of, 80; status of all, March 1, 1919, 
149-152; that have not ratified, only 
Rhode Island, Conneticut and New 
Jersey, containing about five million of 
the one hundred and ten million total 
population—the balance being the 
population of ratifying States, at rate 
of 21 to 1. 

“States rights,” 4, 5, 7. 

Stelzle, Chas. book by, 39 (2d footnote); 
154. 

Stevens, Mrs. E. M. N., quoted, 169. 


Stimulant, alcohol not a, 84. 

Stoddard, Cora F., quoted, 42, 81; books 
of, 183. 

Substitutes for saloons, 64. 

Sunday closing, 35, 88. 

Supreme Court, 8, 122, 168. 

Sweden, 53, 59-61, 121, 156. 

Taft, Ex-Pres. Wm. H., answered, 173- 
177; quoted, 47, 105, 178. 

Tennessee, 4, 80, 152, 153. 

Texas, 7, 10, 11, 31, 152, 153. 

Thwing, Rev. E- W., work of, 183. 

Togo prohibition, 184. 

Total abstinence campaign in support ofi 
“bone dry” prohibition needed, 84. Se»l 
Abstinence. 

Turkey, 62, 135. 

Tutuila, 153. 

United States, longevity test of, 121; 
experiment station for the world on 
liquor restriction, 130; relative con¬ 
sumption of liquors in, 158. See States. 

United States Brewers’ Association, see 
Brewers. 

Utah, 152, 153. 

Venerial diseases, promoted by even 
moderate drinking, 130. 

Vermont, 152. 

Virginia, 31, 78, 80, 152, 153. 

War prohibition, address on, 19-50; 
adopted to some extent by all belliger- 
ants, 135; constitutionality of, 28, 29; 
urged to conserve efficiency of soldiers 
and munition workers, 20-23; fuel, 24; 
transportation, 29; to speed up ship¬ 
building, 31; to save money, 43; to 
protect ballot, 45; and homes, 47; and 
churches, 48. 

Washington, State of, 32, 49, 72, 73, 152 , 
153. 

West Virginia, 152, 153. 

Wheeler, Wayne B., speeches by, 161, 
167. 

Wiley, Dr. H. W., quoted, 41. 

Willard, Dr. Frances E., quoted, 169. 

Wilson, Clarence True, quoted, 48-50. 

Wilson, President Woodrow, cited, 23 , 
26, 27, 28, 31, 40, 41, 42, 49, 50. 

Wine, harmfulness of, 42, 43, 135; does 
not promote happiness, 136; leads to 
drunkenness, 137; better uses of grapes 
than for, 43, 63; should be prohibited 
with other intoxicants, 81, 93, 130. See 
Efficiency; wine and beer to be in¬ 
cluded with whiskey, 183. 

Wisconsin, 152. 

Woman’s Christian Temperance Union, 
138, 154, 155, 183. 

World prohibition our goal, 61, 63, 135, 
185, 186. 

Wyoming 36, 1.52, 153. 

Youth, licensed drink shops a peril to, 
138. 


NTERNATIONAL REFORM BUREAU 206 Pa. Ave. S. E., Wash^ 
ington, D. C., is presenting four thousand books to key men in many 
lands—this to you for one—not alone to show hygenic harm of drink 
and prohibition as best cure, but especially to reveal habitual liquor 
domination of politics, which nullifies democracy at times and is therefore kindred 
to treason. Prohibition won't prohibit, is a threat that should rouse every loyal 
citizen to stamp out the anarchistic trade. 

WILBUR F. CRAFTS 














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This book has been presented to Y. M. C. A. Reading Rooms of all wet states, TO BE 
KEPT IN EVERY CASE ON MAGAZINE TABLE. Tell others. Cooperation invited 
to send the book to leaders and reading rooms in other lands. 


WHY DRY? Briefs of Prohibition: 
Local, State, National and Interna- 
tational by Rev. Wilbur F. Crafts, 
Ph. D., octavo 192 pp., illustrated, 
50 cents, $35 per 100. Published by 
the International Reform Bureau, 
206 Pennsylvania Ave., s. e., Wash¬ 
ington, D. C. 

This is a new enlarged “Worldwide 
Prohibition Edition” of an up-to-the- 
tiinute book, after the fashion of the 
Reform Bureau’s much appreciated 
bulletins from the battle front in the 
National Capital. The book aims to 
present the very latest facts and 
arguments, mostly those of 1918-19. 
The central idea is not the danger that 
moderate drinking will lead to person¬ 
al drunkenness, and drunkenness to 
poverty and crime, with consequent 
economic loss. The chief reasons for 
prohibition are shown to be the injury 
to the nation. The patriotic argument 
is supreme. The very making of liquor 
is shown to be such an enormous waste 
of food and fuel and money and trans¬ 
portation and man-power as no nation 
should allow. The drinking of liquors 
is shown to be far more serious in 
that it lowers the human efficiency. 
For example, while brewing wastes 
three million tons of coal per year, 
drinking by coal miners, according to 
unanimous statement of the Coal 
Operators’ National Convention of 
1917, reduces output of coal “20 to 30 
per cent,” which, at lowest estimate 
would be one hundred and thirty mil¬ 
lion tons. 

The book carefully segregates the 
arguments for local, state, national 
and international prohibition, which 
are often illogically entangled. 

Along with many verified statistics, 
there are frequent short stories of 
human interest, which are flash lights 
of argument. 

The principal new chapters of this 
“Worldwide Prohibition Edition” are: 
“Will China Become the Dump of Our 
Cast-off Breweries?” “Prohibition 
for the Democracies of Europe,” 
“Prohibition for Latin Americas,” 
“Abolish the Bar Room” (an address 
by the editor in Australia), “Results 
of Prohibition in Canada,” “Status of 


Prohibition in U. S. by States,” “Tem¬ 
perance Status of Other Continents,” 
two aadresses by Wayne B. Wheeler, 
LL. D., on National Constitutional 
Prohibition, eight pages on Enforce¬ 
ment of Prohibition by Prof. Irving 
Fisher, Ex-President Taft and others, 
“Why the Temperance Man Should 
Take a Pledge,” “Prophetic Calls to 
Worldwide Prohibition Crusade.” The 
book closes with a full Alphabetical, 
Analytical, Cyclopedic Index.” 

The author has campaigned for 
prohibition in all five continents, and 
has aimed to provide a handbook serv¬ 
iceable in all lands, that will help to 
realize the double slogan: A SA¬ 
LOONLESS NATION IN 1920 AND 
AN ALCOHOL FREE WORLD 
IN 1925. 

Dr. W. F. Crafts has also made an 
abridgment of the stenographic re¬ 
port of the Senate hearing on the 
political activities of the brewers 
(which occupies 1300 quarto pages) in 
a document of 72 pages that contains 
everything of real public interest as to 
the brewers’ devices in defense of 
their beer, with some brief references 
to their pro-German activities also. It 
shows their system of boycotting busi¬ 
ness men, and manipulating black 
labor in the South and white labor in 
the North; also their secret plans 
for influencing candidates for public 
office. This document has been print¬ 
ed at the Government Printing Office 
by order of the Senate Judiciary Sub¬ 
committee on the request of Hon. C. 
H. Randall, to whom requests for free 
single copies should be sent at Room 
318, House Bldg., Washington, D. C. 
(The room No. is necessary as there 
is another C. H. Randall in this Con¬ 
gress.) Those who desire to have 
hundreds of copies sent to lists of 
names can have them at $7 a hundred 
by sending the names and addresses, 
with advance payment always, to Dr. 
W. F. Crafts, 206 Pa. Ave., s. e., 
Washington, D. C. This document is 
regarded by prohibition leaders as 
second to nothing in temperance liter¬ 
ature in importance, as it shows to all 
democracies the danger of tolerating 
the liquor traffic as a menace not 
alone to the body but especially to 
the body politic. 






'hicag:o Examiner. 


The Foe in the Rear. 

















































































































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